Reviews
Victoria Mas: The Mad Women's Ball review - compelling plot meets disquieting historyTuesday, 15 June 2021
To this day, if you take a stroll down Paris’ Boulevard de l’Hôpital, you’ll come across an imposing building: the Hôpital Pitié-Salpêtrière. It’s one of Europe’s foremost hospitals. It’s the place where 20th-century icons Josephine Baker and Michel... Read more... |
Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings & Watercolours, Ashmolean Museum review - a rich arrayMonday, 14 June 2021
Drawing is the cornerstone of artistic practice, but is often overshadowed by "higher" forms of visual art, such as painting and sculpture. When we walk into an art gallery, we find ourselves gravitating towards the large, impressive oil paintings.... Read more... |
After Life, National Theatre review - thanks for the memoriesMonday, 14 June 2021
Limbo, in Jack Thorne’s latest play, is a room lined ceiling-high with drawers, a sort of morgue rebooted as a vast filing system. It apparently provides comfy accommodation for the souls waiting to pass over, and its activities are run in tight... Read more... |
Elinor Cleghorn: Unwell Women review – misunderstanding and misdiagnosisMonday, 14 June 2021
I’m one of the women in the pages of Elinor Cleghorn’s new history of the female body, Unwell Women: A Journey Through Medicine and Myth in a Man-Made World. I’ve dealt with strange chronic pain throughout my early twenties. Still, I’ve always felt... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Screamers - Demo Hollywood 1977Sunday, 13 June 2021
In its first issue of 1979, Melody Maker included an article by Jon Savage on a Los Angeles band named Screamers. “They're ambitious, talented and they want it all NOW,” he wrote. “And they'd sell their grannies (if they have any left) to get it.”... Read more... |
British Ballet Charity Gala, Royal Albert Hall review - a celebration of sortsSaturday, 12 June 2021
The Royal Albert Hall – 150 years old this year and with a commemorative £5 coin to prove it – is a great space for many kinds of spectacle but has done few favours for ballet. I make an exception for Derek Deane’s in-the-round Swan Lake, if... Read more... |
Lupin, Part 2, Netflix review - master of disguise versus racists and liesSaturday, 12 June 2021
Lupin isn’t really about the fictional character it’s named after (the gentleman thief Arsène Lupin, created in 1905 by French writer Maurice Leblanc), but about Assane Diop, who’s an obsessive fan of the Lupin novels. He’s also a gentleman thief... Read more... |
Album: Julian Lage – SquintSaturday, 12 June 2021
Expectations are high with Julian Lage; they always have been. The guitarist is one of the special ones: born on Christmas Day (1987)...appearing with Carlos Santana at age seven... a documentary made about him at eight...clocked by Gary Burton at... Read more... |
Uchida, Philharmonia, Salonen, RFH review - Bach to the futureFriday, 11 June 2021
In the beginning, 38 years ago, came a career-making Mahler Third Symphony for Esa-Pekka Salonen in his first concert with the Philharmonia. Reassembling that vast epic wouldn't be possible under present circumstances. Last night, ending 13 years as... Read more... |
The Father review - gripping dementia dramaFriday, 11 June 2021
Florian Zeller: the name might not be familiar in the world of cinema. But watch this space. His stage play Le Père was widely praised, made its way to Broadway and, following the success, the young French director has adapted it into The Father, a... Read more... |
Nobody review - Bob Odenkirk reinvents himself as all-action dynamoFriday, 11 June 2021
Fans of Bob Odenkirk’s work in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul will be delighted to see him taking centre stage in Ilya Naishuller’s thriller, but perhaps bamboozled at the spectacle of Odenkirk taking the plunge into the blood-splattered... Read more... |
Bostridge, CBSO, Seal, Symphony Hall Birmingham review - large and liveFriday, 11 June 2021
The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra believes that its current post-lockdown summer series features the largest orchestra currently performing live in the UK. It’s not an easy claim to verify, and the full string section certainly wasn’t on... Read more... |
