sat 19/07/2025

Reviews

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support

Tom Birchenough

We are bowled over! 

Harvest review - blood, barley and adaptation

James Saynor

Lovers of a particular novel, when it’s adapted as a movie, often want book and movie to fit together as a hand in a glove. You want it to be like sheet music transfigured into the sound of an orchestra. Too often, though, the resulting film can resemble the sound of the orchestra trying to play in boxing gloves.

Poor Clare, Orange Tree Theatre review - saints...

Gary Naylor

What am I, a philosophical if not political Marxist whose hero is Antonio Gramsci, doing in Harvey Nichols buying Comme des Garçons linen jackets,...

That Bastard, Puccini!, Park Theatre review -...

Helen Hawkins

Before Luigi Illica wrote the libretti for Puccini’s Tosca and Madama Butterfly, he had joined the composer as the librettist in a race to stage the...

Hamlet, Buxton International Festival review -...

Robert Beale

Ambroise Thomas’s version of Hamlet is the flagship production of this year’s Buxton International Festival and was always going to be a considerable...

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

Friendship review - toxic buddy alert

Sebastian Scotney

Dark comedy stars Tim Robinson as a social misfit with cringe benefits

S/HE IS STILL HER/E - The Official Genesis P-Orridge Documentary review - a shapeshifting open window onto a counter-cultural radical

Tim Cumming

Intimate portrait of the Throbbing Gristle & Psychic TV antagonist

Billie Eilish, O2 review - power, authenticity and deep connection

Katie Colombus

A stripped back, intimate and emotionally charged gig

Falstaff, Glyndebourne review - knockabout and nostalgia in postwar Windsor

Boyd Tonkin

A fat knight to remember, and snappy stagecraft, overcome some tedious waits

Superman review - America's ultimate immigrant

Nick Hasted

James Gunn's over-stuffed reboot stutters towards wonder

Salome, LSO, Pappano, Barbican review - a partnership in a million

David Nice

Asmik Grigorian is vocal perfection in league with a great conductor and orchestra

Till the Stars Come Down, Theatre Royal Haymarket review - a family hilariously and tragically at war

Helen Hawkins

Beth Steel makes a stirring West End debut with her poignant play for today

Too Much, Netflix - a romcom that's oversexed, and over here

Helen Hawkins

Lena Dunham's new series presents an England it's often hard to recognise

Music Reissues Weekly: Beggars Arkive - Gary Numan's 1979 John Peel session

Kieron Tyler

Saying goodbye to Tubeway Army

The Other Way Around review - teasing Spanish study of a breakup with unexpected depth

Helen Hawkins

Jonás Trueba's film holds the romcom up to the light for playful scrutiny

Nye, National Theatre review - Michael Sheen's full-blooded Bevan returns to the Olivier

Heather Neill

Revisiting Tim Price's dream-set account of the founder of the health service

Emily Kam Kngwarray, Tate Modern review - glimpses of another world

Sarah Kent

Pictures that are an affirmation of belonging

theartsdesk at the Ravenna Festival 2025 - Cervantes, Beethoven and Byron transfigured

David Nice

Muti revitalised by young musicians, and a three-year theatre project reaches completion

Girl From The North Country, Old Vic review - Dylan's songs fail to lift the mood

Gary Naylor

Fragmented, cliched story rescued by tremendous acting, singing and music

The Estonian Song and Dance Celebration 2025 review - the mass expression of freedom

Kieron Tyler

Communion, ecstasy, rain and traditional clothing

Insomnia, Channel 5 review - a chronicle of deaths foretold

Adam Sweeting

Sarah Pinborough's psychological thriller is cluttered but compelling

The Merry Wives of Windsor, Shakespeare's Globe review - hedonistic fizz for a summer's evening

Rachel Halliburton

Emma Pallant and Katherine Pearce are formidable opponents to Falstaff's buffoonery

Run Sister Run, Arcola Theatre review - emphatic emotions, overwrought production

Aleks Sierz

Chloë Moss’s latest play about the different lives of two sisters is deeply felt

Album: Gwenno - Utopia

Kieron Tyler

The Welsh musical explorer surveys her life

Live Aid at 40: When Rock'n'Roll Took on the World, BBC Two review - how Bob Geldof led pop's battle against Ethiopian famine

Adam Sweeting

When wackily-dressed pop stars banded together to give a little help to the helpless

Sabrina Carpenter, Hyde Park BST review - a sexy, sparkly, summer phenomenon

Katie Colombus

The Summer of Sabrina continues to shine bright

Music Reissues Weekly: Motörhead - The Manticore Tapes

Kieron Tyler

Snapshot of Lemmy and co in August 1976 proves fascinating

Kiefer / Van Gogh, Royal Academy review - a pairing of opposites

Sarah Kent

Small scale intensity meets large scale melodrama

Siglo de Oro, Wigmore Hall review - electronic Lamentations and Trojan tragedy

Bernard Hughes

Committed and intense performance of a newly-commissioned oratorio

newsletter

Get a weekly digest of our critical highlights in your inbox each Thursday!

Simply enter your email address in the box below

View previous newsletters

latest in today

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages... ...
Album: Bonnie Dobson & The Hanging Stars - Dreams

What a great album – and what a great story to lift the heart in these fetid times. A story that crosses oceans and decades and brings together a...

Harvest review - blood, barley and adaptation

Lovers of a particular novel, when it’s adapted as a movie, often want book and movie to fit together as a hand in a glove. You want it to be like...

Poor Clare, Orange Tree Theatre review - saints cajole us si...

What am I, a philosophical if not political Marxist whose hero is Antonio Gramsci, doing in Harvey Nichols buying Comme des Garçons...

Album: Alex Warren - You'll Be Alright, Kid

The best-selling single so far this year in the UK is ...

That Bastard, Puccini!, Park Theatre review - inventive comi...

Before Luigi Illica wrote the libretti for Puccini’s Tosca and Madama Butterfly, he had joined the composer as the...

Hamlet, Buxton International Festival review - how to re-ima...

Ambroise Thomas’s version of Hamlet is the flagship production of this year’s Buxton International Festival and was always going to be a...

Friendship review - toxic buddy alert

The frenetic brand of humour that Tim Robinson brings to Friendship comes from a long lineage. There have...

Album: Slikback - Attrition

In the eternal now of the strobe-lit sweatbox, innovation functions in a different way to the rest of culture. Yes of course, the thrill of the...

Interview: Quinteto Astor Piazzolla on playing in London and...

“I still can’t believe that some pseudo-critics continue to accuse me of having murdered...