Reviews
Cost of Living, Hampstead Theatre review - tough but tenderFriday, 01 February 2019
The Off Broadway production of Cost of Living two years ago brought Martyna Majok the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, the height of acclaim of which most new writers – Majok, with four plays behind her, has yet to turn 35 – can only dream. High... Read more... |
Green Book review - is this Oscar hopeful too good to be true?Friday, 01 February 2019
With five nominations, Green Book is cruising optimistically towards Oscar night, but it’s not all plain sailing for director Peter Farrelly’s mixed-race fairy tale about a posh black musician and his thuggish Italian minder. The film is being... Read more... |
Camping, Sky Atlantic, review - Lena Dunham's tentative British exportFriday, 01 February 2019
When British sitcoms head west anything can happen. For every success – The Office had a happy second life with Steve Carell – there are half a dozen others that got lost in translation, including Coupling, Getting On, Gavin and Stacey, The It Crowd... Read more... |
Velvet Buzzsaw review - an acerbic takedown of the LA art sceneFriday, 01 February 2019
Sitting somewhere between Ruben Östlund’s The Square and Final Destination, Dan Gilroy’s Velvet Buzzsaw is a satirical supernatural thriller that goes for the jugular of the LA art scene.We open at the Art Basel Miami Beach, where art snobs with fat... Read more... |
Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams, Victoria & Albert Museum - sumptuousThursday, 31 January 2019
The heart of the V&A’s sumptuous Christian Dior: Designer of Dreams is a room dedicated to the workmanship of the fashion house’s ateliers. A mirrored ceiling reflects dazzling strip-lit cases which hold the ghosts of ballgowns, slips and... Read more... |
Counting Sheep, The Vaults review - visceral recreation of an uprisingThursday, 31 January 2019
Is there a connection between revolution and theatre? The answer has to be yes – a visceral one. The supremacy of symbols, the collective strength of a crowd, a sense that some kind of pressure valve is being released to challenge the dominant... Read more... |
Hadelich, CBSO, Măcelaru, Symphony Hall Birmingham review - industrial strength Vaughan WilliamsThursday, 31 January 2019
Well, I didn’t expect that – and judging from the way the rest of the audience reacted, nor did anyone else. After Cristian Măcelaru slammed the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra full speed into the final chord of Vaughan Williams’s Fourth... Read more... |
The Dandy Warhols, O2 Institute, Birmingham review - a silver jubilee jaunt with plenty of new tunesThursday, 31 January 2019
This week, the Dandy Warhols rocked up in Birmingham to begin the UK leg of their 25th anniversary tour with a gig in the Institute’s shabby but beautiful main hall, with its dusty neo-classical alabaster reliefs and almost comically antiquated... Read more... |
Kes, Leeds Playhouse review - seminal Yorkshire story soarsWednesday, 30 January 2019
Robert Alan Evans’ adaptation of Kes is a dark, expressionist reworking of Barry Hines’ novella. It pays lip service to Ken Loach’s iconic film version, and most of the memorable bits are present and correct here: the wince-inducing rant from head... Read more... |
The Last Survivors, BBC Two review - living onMonday, 28 January 2019
When they were children the interviewees in this film – the last survivors – were taken away in incomprehensible circumstances, on their way to be murdered for who they were, in Germany and places further east. A handful of the few thousands who... Read more... |
Die Walküre, LPO, Jurowski, RFH review - love shines outMonday, 28 January 2019
Harpers on the undeniably offensive aspect of Wagner the man might question attending a concert performance of his second Ring opera on World Holocaust Day. Fortunately there's nothing anti-semitic to be found anywhere in Die Walküre. As embodied by... Read more... |
Damrau, BRSO, Jansons, Barbican review - broad and passionate StraussMonday, 28 January 2019
There is no doubting Diana Damrau’s star power. She is not a demonstrative performer, and her voice is small, but the sheer character of her tone, and the passion she invests, make every line special. She is not one to over-sentimentalise either, so... Read more... |
