theartsdesk com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Adam Sweeting
Saturday, 04 February 2023
Bald, barrel-shaped and pugnacious, Doron Kavillio (Lior Raz) could have been conceived as the anti-Bond or the un-Ethan Hunt. But as action heroes go, Doron can mix it with the...
Veronica Lee
Saturday, 04 February 2023
The Shrek universe expands a little more with Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, another computer-animated family film from DreamWorks, with Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek Pinnault...
Liz Thomson
Saturday, 04 February 2023
Shania Twain describes her sixth studio album as “a song of gratitude and appreciation. I was inspired that I still had air in my lungs” – and it certainly is a hi-energy affair,...
Gary Naylor
Friday, 03 February 2023
If All's Well That Ends Well, Measure for Measure and Troilus and Cressida have earned the sobriquet "‘problem plays", what price Titus Andronicus? Does a director seek out a Saw...
Markie Robson-Scott
Friday, 03 February 2023
Yes, Brendan Fraser gives a fine, Oscar-nominated performance as a morbidly obese man in director Darren Aronfsky’s mawkish, voyeuristic The Whale. Best known for Gods and...
David Nice
Friday, 03 February 2023
Salome was not to get her head on a silver platter: Jennifer Davis, due to sing the bloody final scene of Strauss’s opera, had been experiencing abdominal pains during her first...
Helen Hawkins
Friday, 03 February 2023
The set of 2:22 A Ghost Story is open to the auditorium when we arrive and locates us at once in gentrification-land. We are...
Saskia Baron
Friday, 03 February 2023
It’s been a good year for donkeys at the cinema. Not only did Martin McDonagh make a surprise star out of Jenny the...
Harry Thorfinn-George
Friday, 03 February 2023
Kelela, the DC-born artist, has been fusing R&B with experimental electronics since her 2013 mixtape Cut 4 Me. In 2017...
David Nice
Thursday, 02 February 2023
It’s always a disappointment when the Venusberg orgy Wagner added in 1861 to his original, 1845 Tannhäuser to suit Parisian...
Kieron Tyler
Thursday, 02 February 2023
It’s the sound of the sun. Panda Bear – born Noah Lennox – is singing in a voice with the purity and warmth of Brian Wilson...
Saskia Baron
Thursday, 02 February 2023
You Resemble Me is the very definition of a passion project, and all the better for it. First-time director Dina Amer...
Aleks Sierz
Thursday, 02 February 2023
Culture which arrives from the margins to the mainstream is a classic phenomenon. In the case of Sam Steiner’s Lemons Lemons...
Thomas H Green
Thursday, 02 February 2023
The Waeve is the debut album from life partners Rose Elinor Dougall (long ago in The Pipettes) and Graham Coxon (of Blur),...
Aleks Sierz
Wednesday, 01 February 2023
Do the right thing! But doing the right thing isn’t easy – especially if you are a teen. And a female teen who is being...
Graham Fuller
Wednesday, 01 February 2023
At their best, horror movies reflect destabilisation caused by cracks in the social fabric. The crack indicated in the...
Tim Cumming
Wednesday, 01 February 2023
Lisa O’Neill is a part of the new wave of Irish contemporary folk artists, one that encompasses the likes of Lankum, Ye...
David Nice
Tuesday, 31 January 2023
It’s dangerous to claim a sense of absolute rightness about a musical performance; that could mean no more than responding...
Helen Hawkins
Tuesday, 31 January 2023
Frantic Assembly’s Othello, originally co-developed with the Lyric in 2008, is back in its third iteration, and it’s still...
tv
Fauda, Season 4, Netflix review - Israeli terrorism thriller gets darker and dirtier
Fourth time around, the human cost is becoming too much to bear
Women at War, Netflix review - contrasting stories entwine during the chaos of World War One
Passion, intrigue and heartbreak behind the front lines
film
Puss in Boots: The Last Wish review - thrilling adventure with Antonio Banderas
Computer-animated fun
The Whale review - Brendan Fraser stars in a fat suit
Darren Aronofsky's stagey, sentimental portrait of a dying, obese man
EO review - lyrical tale of a donkey's odyssey
Jerzy Skolimowski takes the audience on an incredible journey
new music
Northern Winter Beat 2023 review - Panda Bear, Sonic Boom and Širom amongst the highlights in Denmark’s north
Agreeable Aalborg accommodates a festival integral to its environment
classical
Philharmonia, Hrůša, RFH review - total brilliance in Bartók, Dvořák and Strauss
No singing Salome, but this was still a firebrand of a concert
Leonskaja, Staatskapelle Streichquartett, Wigmore Hall / Secret Byrd, St Martin-in-the-Fields review - genuine versus theatrical
Brahms illuminated, Byrd rather more obliquely showcased
Ólafsson, LPO, Gardner, RFH review - spirit of delight
A curate's-egg turn from the Icelandic pianist in Schumann followed by magisterial Elgar
opera
Tannhäuser, Royal Opera review - true goodness triumphs in the end
Lise Davidsen's fully-realised Elisabeth is no pallid virgin in this mixed revival
First Person: soprano Soraya Mafi on why Glyndebourne's tour cancellation is disastrous
Though Arts Council England has partly reinstated English National Opera's grant, its cuts still have devastating consequences for the regions
Least Like the Other, Irish National Opera, Linbury Theatre review - the harrowing of Rosemary Kennedy
Composer Brian Irvine, director/designer Netia Jones and top performers mesmerise
theatre
Titus Andronicus, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse review - notorious play hits and misses
Tricksy staging distracts and disappoints
2:22 A Ghost Story, Lyric Theatre review - Cheryl makes an impressive stage debut
Danny Robins' clever play gains a creditable star turn in its fifth run
Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons, Harold Pinter Theatre review - cool cast chills the drama
West End transfer for Sam Steiner’s fringe classic does the play no favours
dance
Julie Cunningham & Co, Sadler's Wells review - a fine piece of work, with added spice
The other Cunningham stakes out their territory in contemporary dance, and the non-binary debate
Swan Lake, English National Ballet, Coliseum review - the story of a deluded prince
The corps de ballet take the laurels in Derek Deane's dependably fine production
comedy
Alex Edelman, Menier Chocolate Factory review - London run for unmissable off-Broadway hit
How a Jewish standup found the funny side of a roomful of white nationalists
Books
'I let it emerge': an interview with Fiona Benson on the cusp of the TS Eliot Prize announcement
The poet discusses her new book, mayflies, motherhood, and memory
Jaan Kross: A Book of Falsehoods review - plague, power and deception in 16th century Tallinn
At last, the translation of volume three in the Estonian master's great historical trilogy
visual arts
All the Beauty and the Bloodshed review - superb documentary about a campaigning artist
Nan Goldin's fight against the makers of Oxycontin is as gutsy as her work
Spain and the Hispanic World, Royal Academy review - a monumental survey
The refurbishment of New York's Hispanic Society provides a unique opportunity to see its treasures
latest comments
Thanks - I'll correct that. Brainslip. Sorry that...
It's the best heartwarming compassionate, loving...
Wonderfully said. Just one correction, it's...
Maybe not alone, but in a very small minority....
Great to see the Elinor Frey concertos album...
I was there and in the circle seats. I had a hard...
Not all the audience! I thought it was tedious.
I agree with Colette’s comment above. It’s great...