Reviews
judith.flanders
If you’ve seen pictures of the Ballets Russes, then you’ve seen Hoppé photographs. But then, if you’ve seen any society pictures from the 1920s and 1930s, then you’ve seen Hoppé. And famous writers. In fact, for portrait photography in Britain between the World Wars, you can pretty well bet the photo is Hoppé’s. But what's so good about this new exhibition is that it shows a side to Hoppé that is much less well-known - the street-view. And these photographs are thrilling, in form as well as content.E.O. (for Emil Otto) Hoppé moved to Britain from his native Germany in 1902, aged 22, and Read more ...
Nick Hasted
The animals 17-year-old Josh Cody has to survive are his own criminal family. The Codys are hardly the Corleones. Led by sweetly smiling, grandmotherly matriarch Smurf (Jacki Weaver) as they fume and feud in Melbourne’s suburbs, this motley gang of five’s only outstanding quality is their ruthlessness. Deposited with them when his mum overdoses on drugs, the shy teenager navigates between armed robber Uncle Pope (Ben Mendelsohn) and wired drug dealer Uncle Craig (Sullivan Stapleton). Senior detective Leckie (a moustached, understated Guy Pearce) would also like a word, as Josh tries to Read more ...
Russ Coffey
Rock-folkies can sure be snobs. Even though New Hampshire-born Ray LaMontagne is still relatively unknown over here, there are still purists who view his records with suspicion. They feel the voice is just too huge, the sound too commercial. The irony is that no-one courts attention less than LaMontagne. Last night he delivered the entire concert from a static spot just to the left of the band. And apparently he’s as withdrawn offstage as he is on. But the RFH saw him focussed. Focussed on finding the right way to channel that part-bluebird, part-bear he has for a voice.And on the strength of Read more ...
Jasper Rees
There was a moment in last night’s Silk when a young solicitor turned up late for a trial. He was also an actor, he explained to his client’s counsel, and had to attend an audition. For a Head & Shoulders ad. The USP of Peter Moffat’s courtroom dramas is that, more than any writer since John Mortimer, he knows whereof he speaks. Having once been a barrister himself, the serpentine ins and outs of chambers, the politicking and skulduggery etc etc are his area of expertise. So you take it on trust that the events dramatised here are the truth and nothing but.Thus a barrister Read more ...
Ismene Brown
An audience favourite has a USP that fills the house as long as they maintain the suspense - with William Forsythe, it’s the quality Diaghilev prized: unpredictability. When he set out in Germany in the 1980s he evolved an extreme classical ballet. Just as people got used to his distortions, he went into conceptual theatre. Expected to be gnomic and abstract, he then did emotional dance-theatre about his young wife’s death. Now to comedy territory in I Don’t Believe in Outer Space, which is only on for two nights at Sadler's Wells, indicating that his old London muckers worry about this Read more ...
graham.rickson
The clipped Fifties accents raise a smile for the first few minutes, but what’s startling about this new production of Terence Rattigan’s 1952 play is how universal, how timeless the story is. Director Sarah Esdaile wisely decides to play things respectfully straight, and within seconds the time and place, both beautifully evoked in Ruari Murchison’s detailed set, melted into irrelevance. Maxine Peake plays Hester Collyer, attempting suicide after her boyfriend Freddie has forgotten her birthday. After her life is saved by the enigmatic fellow tenant Mr Miller, her back story is slowly Read more ...
Matt Wolf
Just in time to capitalise - is that how that word is spelled? - on awards season, along comes the latest Broadway-to-Britain transplant, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, a musical all about a culture that likes to win, win, WIN! Does William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin's surprise 2005 New York hit go to the top of the London class? Intermittently, yes. Charming and cheeky at its best, repetitive and sentimental elsewhere, the piece may simply be too echt-American to repeat its success here, though it certainly marks a change at the Donmar from the daunting fare this playhouse has Read more ...
judith.flanders
Jan, or Janin? Gossart, or Gossaert? Or Mabuse? After a mere five centuries, we haven’t settled on a name quite yet (even for this exhibition: at the Metropolitan Museum, the same show spelt it “Gossart”). We don’t know where he was born, although Maubeuge, then in Hainault, now in France, is the best guess, hence “Mabuse”. His birth date too is a mystery: the Grove Dictionary of Art suggests 1478, while the National Gallery just shrugs and gives us “active 1503”. What is in no doubt, however, in this very model of an exhibition, is that Jan Gossaert represented not merely one of the Read more ...
David Nice
Sir Simon Rattle's clever programming struck again last night, showing us that musical neoclassicism - for want of a better word, which would be something like neo-everything - didn't begin with Stravinsky, whose Apollo ballet is surely his most elevated set of gestures to the past. Tchaikovsky, the rococo twiddles of whose complete Nutcracker this team seems to have enjoyed so much on a recent recording, would probably take the palm, though Mahler, of all composers, will do, too. At least, his Fourth Symphony begins that way. And soon there was more music not of this world to match Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
This month's Singles & Downloads leads off with a new one from an absolute kingpin of US pop and hip hop. However, the focus is equally on the backwaters and curious places where other lively varieties of music dwell. From dancehall raucousness to erudite indie, from ranty punk to funk reinterpretations of American minimalist composition, all pop life is here and keenly assessed by Thomas H Green and Joe Muggs.Kanye West, All of the Lights (Def Jam)
It is a preposterous notion, trying to cram vocals from Elton John, Alicia Keys, Fergie, John Legend, and Elly Jackson of La Roux all onto Read more ...
fisun.guner
Ross Kemp won a Bafta for his documentary about being on the frontline in Afghanistan, so perhaps I should begin by saying all due respect, and all that, but how much can you ratchet up the hardman image before it threatens to dissolve into self-parody? And with a title like Ross Kemp: Extreme World showing on Sky 1, well, where else could we be heading?For this new series we’ll see him talking to child soldiers and victims of mutilations and rape in the Democratic Republic of Congo, he’ll be sniffing out bloody turf wars in Mexico, and then he’ll be back on home turf with sex trafficking Read more ...
graeme.thomson
It’s the convention to review concerts on the first night of a tour rather than the last, but in this case it transpired it was rather wise to make an exception. These two groups may make very different kinds of music, but in their questing desire to escape classification last night they seemed to share a certain esprit de corps which added to the sense of occasion.Their jaunt around the UK was a joint headline tour, requiring each group to alternate top billing. It fell to Portico Quartet to open last night, which meant a shorter set that perhaps didn’t allow them time to settle in and Read more ...