Reviews
Matt Wolf
Contemporary London life in all its forbidding, faceless swirl makes for a visually busy evening at Boy, the Leo Butler play that finally isn't as fully arresting as one keeps wanting it to be. An admirably kaleidoscopic view of the capital as filtered through 17-year-old Liam (Frankie Fox), aka the "boy" of the title, Sacha Wares' production utilises a 26-strong cast to address the notion of aimlessness in our age of austerity – the sheer volume of actors in our midst constituting a welcome rebuke to the pinched economic landscape all its own. But once you've clocked the populous Read more ...
Mark Sanderson
The pampered bureaucrats who commission television drama have suffered from tunnel vision for years. Today a thriller series must feature at least four of the following: a family in peril; a dysfunctional investigator; foreign baddies; terrorism; cybercrime; a Chinese connection; striking camera angles and colour filters; moody music; and, above all, a pervasive feeling of dread.The Tunnel: Sabotage, which began on Sky Atlantic last night (with all episodes now available via Sky Box Sets), has the blooming lot. The first series, a cross-channel version of The Bridge, closely echoed its Read more ...
David Nice
It was twelfth night for Christopher Wheeldon's two-year-old, three-act Shakespearean ballet, and this newcomer had one nervous anticipatory question. The verbal music is gone, only the plot remains, so could A Winter's Tale the play inspire Wheeldon to imaginative heights in the way that Romeo and Juliet brought out the best in MacMillan, via Prokofiev? Almost, which is quite a compliment: the same team that brought us Alice's Adventures in Wonderland have pulled off a neat show, and Wheeldon is again working with five of the top dancers he knows best.Perhaps a play with less magical poetry Read more ...
Saskia Baron
Colonel Powell (Helen Mirren) has a problem: she suspects that a British woman who converted to Islam and tops the international terrorism hit list is holed up in a house in a suburb of Nairob controlled by Al-Shabaab. Can her local agent (Barkhad Abdi) fly his tiny spy drone inside the house and confirm the terrorist’s identity? And are the local military ready to capture the terrorist if she leaves? Powell is orchestrating the operation from an army hangar in Sussex thousands of miles away, with all the stern precision of a Jane Tennison in camo uniform. Director Gavin Hood has Read more ...
Marina Vaizey
The BBC opened its examination of the history of European togetherness with presenter Nick Robinson beaming at us from the top of those White Cliffs, looking out at the glistening sea which made us an island (until, of course, Mrs Thatcher supported the Channel Tunnel).This inconclusive history of Britain in and out of Europe began at the very end of the Second World War, when the eloquent proposer of a united Europe which definitely included West Germany was Sir Winston Churchill. This first episode of two, subtitled "An Island Apart", set the scene with two ex-politicians, Hague and Blair, Read more ...
Marianka Swain
Generation Y are worriers. There’s certainly plenty to fuel that angst, from mounting debts, employment uncertainty and the ever-worsening housing crisis to international conflict and terrorism – as explored by a slew of recent articles (and the occasional “How anxious are you, doomed millennial?” quiz). Brad Birch’s new 80-minute play occasionally wanders into that thinkpiece territory, but in the main, he and director Mel Hillyard have found a vividly theatrical form for this modern malaise.Overworked history teacher Nick (Ciarán Owens, pictured below with Shvorne Marks) is plagued by Read more ...
Sebastian Scotney
“The rests, the silences in Bach are never for nothing,” I once heard the Dutch cellist and baroque specialist Anner Bylsma telling a student in a masterclass. “You jump up from them, you reach higher.” Hearing the Bach Collegium Japan on Sunday night kept bringing those phrases to mind, because the listener in the acoustic of Saffron Hall really does get to hear this music, so delicately played, emerging again and again from silence. The performers stand in readiness. Then, propelled by Masaaki Suziki’s benign, ultra-clear beat, the music springs into action. The unflamboyant, serving- Read more ...
Steve O'Rourke
The Dark Souls series is a franchise based on steep learning curves, uncompromising enemies, frustration, repetition and reward. It doesn’t suffer fools, it has an unwelcoming personality, and it’s neither funny nor always fun to play.A game that isn’t always fun to play! Now there’s a unique selling point. So why have the two previous instalments been so highly regarded? Why do action RPG fans talk about the trilogy with hushed reverence and knowing looks that infer taming of this unforgiving beast is a rare badge of honour to be worn with pride? Because the payoff, the overwhelming sense of Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
If this were a British series it would be called 22.11.63, since the title refers to the date on which President John F Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. Anyway, this is a TV version of Stephen King's hit novel, and its mix of historical conspiracy and time-travelling sci-fi is perfect fodder for its producer, JJ Abrams.You have to swallow a fairly hefty portion of disbelief to allow yourself to get into the story, namely that the homely neighbourhood diner in Maine run by Al Templeton (Chris Cooper) has a porthole through time hidden in the pantry. Every time you walk in there, you're Read more ...
Ed Owen
Spying is not what it used to be. Old-schoolers beat the baddie, beat the house at roulette and then beat someone to death without even creasing their shirt. Today’s spy seems ill-equipped. Take Ryan Reynolds’s Bill Pope. We know he’s in the CIA because he’s dodging around the City of London looking conspicuous. Anarchist hacker Heimbahl (Jordi Molla) easily hookwinks and kills him.This is bad news because Pope knows where The Wormhole is. This is the ultimate hacking device, allowing the user to control anything – launch a nuclear missile, turn off your central heating – anything. Heimbahl, Read more ...
peter.quinn
Masterly improvising, outstanding compositions, a complete understanding between the musicians. On every count this was an exceptional set, as emotionally engaging as it was lovingly delivered.Working for three years in her late teens with the great Vinicius de Moraes and the singer-songwriter Toquinho, the Sao Paolo-born, New York-based pianist, vocalist and composer Eliane Elias grew up with bossa nova. So it seemed entirely appropriate that her trio, featuring Marc Johnson on bass and Mauricio Zottarelli on drums, kicked off their set with a sparkling arrangement of the Jobim/Moraes Read more ...
David Nice
This second concert in the Barbican residency of Masaaki Suzuki and the Bach Collegium Japan transported us across the water from the concert hall to St Giles Cripplegate, and from the greatest of masses to organ masterpieces and, among motets, a work of which Mozart allegedly said, "at last, something to learn from". All that cascading counterpoint in Singet dem Herrn in a bright church acoustic ideally suited to this music told us why.The programming and the choral singing were perfection, Suzuki's handling of the St Giles organ more ambiguous: it's always hard to tell on that instrument Read more ...