#MeToo
Beyond the Grace Note, Sky Arts review - march of the women conductorsMonday, 09 March 2020
Perhaps the most surprising thing is how good natured they all sound. There’s no anger. At least, not much – one can’t help wondering what they say off air. Through a kaleidoscope of vocation, hopes, dreams, inspirations, and worries about stuff... Read more... |
Women Beware Women, Shakespeare's Globe, review – wittily toxic upgrade of a Jacobean tragedyFriday, 28 February 2020
This raunchy, gleefully cynical production takes one of Thomas Middleton’s most famous tragedies and turns it into a Netflix-worthy dark comedy. Where the themes of incest, betrayal, cougar-action and multiple murder would be spun out over several... Read more... |
Imagining Ireland, Barbican review - raising women's voicesMonday, 24 February 2020
Recent politics surround the EU and nationhood, fantasies of Irish Sea bridges and trading borders more porous than limestone have revived the granular rub between Eire and Britain, and the Celtic Tiger cool of the Nineties is a history module these... Read more... |
Sex Education, Series 2, Netflix review - the teen sex show we deservedFriday, 14 February 2020
Netflix’s Sex Education has returned to our screens and streams. The show made waves last year for its refreshing take on the teen comedy-drama. It took on abortion, consent and female pleasure — subjects strikingly absent from our actual high... Read more... |
Jenny Offill: Weather review - the low hum of misgivingSunday, 09 February 2020
Neatly contained, truncated by decisive white space, Jenny Offill’s paragraphs – they have been called “fragments” and even “stanzas” – might be the first thing you notice about Weather, if you are new to her writing. Sometimes they are pithy,... Read more... |
The Taming of the Shrew, Sam Wanamaker Playhouse review - a confused and toothless messSaturday, 08 February 2020
Say what you will about The Taming of the Shrew (and you’ll be in good company), but it is one of Shakespeare’s clearest plays. Asked to summarise the action of, say, Richard II or Love’s Labours Lost and you might lose your way somewhere between... Read more... |
Asking For It, Birmingham Repertory Theatre review - victim-blaming and abuse in small town IrelandThursday, 06 February 2020
In a world where the contentious report of a young English woman gang raped by teenage boys in Cyprus last year continues to make headlines, Asking For It is more than relevant. Such scenarios are by no means new but are once again making news... Read more... |
Faustus: That Damned Woman, Lyric Hammersmith review - gender swap yields muddled resultsWednesday, 29 January 2020
Changing the gender of the title character “highlights the way in which women still operate in a world designed by and for men,” argues Chris Bush, whose reimagining of Marlowe’s play premieres at the Lyric ahead of a UK tour. It’s certainly a... Read more... |
Album: Kesha - High RoadWednesday, 29 January 2020
Doubters presume Kesha’s multi-million-selling success derives mainly from a decade ago, the time of her monster hit, “Tik Tok”? Since then, the thinking goes, after the gruelling, much-publicised sexual abuse court cases with Dr Luke, she’s more a... Read more... |
Bombshell review – powerful, to a pointThursday, 16 January 2020
With Harvey Weinstein about to go on trial, the timing is particularly apt for a film that outlines the fall from grace of another media giant who used his powerful position to sexually victimise women. The late Roger Ailes was the CEO of the right-... Read more... |
Best of 2019: TheatreSaturday, 28 December 2019
Political dysfunction and societal distress led many amongst us to the brink this year, so where better than the theatre to find succour if not always solace in the abundantly thoughtful offerings of a creative community as often as not working at... Read more... |
Charlie's Angels review - feminism-lite action comedyFriday, 29 November 2019
“Badass” – as applied to dynamic women – and “girl power” may be the kinds of exhausted clichés that are reductive in the #MeToo and Time’s Up era, but the new Charlie’s Angels movie revitalises the attitude they describe in a way that’s neither... Read more... |
