London 2012
DVD/Blu-ray: Life Is SweetFriday, 29 September 2017
Sweet isn’t the right word; in Mike Leigh’s 1990 film, life is unfair, frustrating and confusing by turns. Though, despite the darkness, Life Is Sweet exudes positivity and remains one of Leigh’s funniest, most quotable features.Many of the best... Read more... |
London 2012 and Beyond: The Best of 2012Monday, 31 December 2012
The Mayan calendar recently suggested it was all over. It is now, almost. 2012 was, by anyone’s lights, an annus mirabilis for culture on these shores. The world came to the United Kingdom, and the kingdom was indeed more or less united by a genuine... Read more... |
Birmingham Royal Ballet, The Grand Tour/ Faster/ The Dream, Sadler's WellsSaturday, 27 October 2012
Birmingham Royal Ballet’s second triple bill at Sadler’s Wells this week is aptly titled "Autumn Celebration", acknowledging the season’s diverse weather through eclectic, light-hearted programming.Joe Layton’s The Grand Tour is a nostalgic 1971... Read more... |
Taking Part/After the Party, Criterion TheatreWednesday, 01 August 2012
Britain may be in grip of Olympic fever, but two playwrights are questioning our unqualified cheer: should we really break out into an excited sweat, they ask, at the mention of beach volleyball, Rebecca Adlington and Danny Boyle? Taking Part and... Read more... |
theartsdesk Olympics: En Garde! Fencing on Stage and ScreenTuesday, 31 July 2012
Is that a sabre you see before you? It could be if you’re talking any of multiple stage and screen versions of Hamlet, the Shakespeare play that puts centre-stage arguably the most esoteric of all Olympics activities: fencing. (Well, OK, beach... Read more... |
theartsdesk Olympics: The WrestlerSunday, 29 July 2012
What of the star sportsman whose glory days are behind him? It seems an absurd question to pose, with the sun barely set on the theatrics of Danny Boyle’s opening ceremony, but for Randy “The Ram” Robinson it’s everyday existentialism.Of course it's... Read more... |
The Opening Ceremony, BBC OneSaturday, 28 July 2012
Oh to have been a fly on the wall at the Palace. “Your Majesty, we’ve had a request from a Mr Boyle. It concerns the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games.” “I’m already opening the blessed thing, aren’t I? What else do they want?” “Ma’am, they just... Read more... |
Gallery: Collecting the Olympic Games, British LibraryThursday, 26 July 2012
As London 2012 finally settles into the blocks for its two-week dash after seven years of preparation, the British Library has cast a nostalgic look back to the two previous Olympiads hosted by the city, in 1908 and 1948. The story the images tell... Read more... |
Twenty Twelve: The Finale, BBC TwoWednesday, 25 July 2012
So that’s all over then. Which isn’t good. The gnawing anxiety for followers of Twenty Twelve, the programme whose theme song is “There may be trouble ahead...", has been whether real-life events would become so like it - or even worse, more like it... Read more... |
theartsdesk Olympics: Steve Prefontaine (times two)Wednesday, 25 July 2012
Movies often come unwittingly in pairs, whether you're talking Capote and Infamous (both about Truman Capote) or Valmont and Dangerous Liaisons (both adapted from the epistolary novel by Laclos). And so it was that the late 1990s saw the... Read more... |
theartsdesk Olympics: Athletes at the operaTuesday, 24 July 2012
Triumph, despair, glory and struggle: the Olympic Games might technically be a sporting event, but in spirit and essence they are pure drama. Film-makers may have shouted loudest about this discovery, generating hit after Olympic-themed hit... Read more... |
The Boy Who Fell into a Book, Soho TheatreMonday, 23 July 2012
Alan Ayckbourn refuses to write down to children, and it shows. The Boy Who Fell into a Book is as sophisticated in structure as it is family-friendly in content. The narrative follows nine-year-old Kevin, who is absorbed (literally) into the... Read more... |
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