obituary
John Hurt: 'If I’ve been anything I’ve been adventurous'Saturday, 28 January 2017
John Hurt, who has died at the age of 77, belonged to that great generation of British thespians who started in the 1960s and eventually, one by one, ended up knighted: Michael Gambon, Albert Finney, Ian McKellen, Anthony Hopkins, Ian Holm, Nigel... Read more... |
When Snowdon starred in Peter Sellers' home movieFriday, 13 January 2017
On screen, two hoodlums in macs and homburgs debate the best way to waste a victim. One of them, played by Peter Sellers, proffers a revolver. The other, who from under his hat has something of Herbert Lom about his profile, pulls on a cigarette and... Read more... |
John Berger: the critic as artistTuesday, 03 January 2017
It’s hardly the lot of an art critic to be loved and admired, still less to speak to an audience that might reasonably be called “the public”. And how many will find their ideas still current 40 years on? All of these things can be said for John... Read more... |
Richard Adams: 'If I'd known how well I could write I’d have started earlier'Wednesday, 28 December 2016
Richard Adams, who has died at the age of 96, was the high priest of anthropomorphism. Much his most famous and loved novel is his first, Watership Down, published when he was in his early 50s and so instantly successful that he was able to give up... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Actor Robert VaughnSaturday, 12 November 2016
New York-born actor Robert Vaughn, who has died at the age of 83, achieved massive popular success when he starred as the sleek secret agent Napoleon Solo in The Man from U.N.C.L.E., which ran for four seasons from 1964 to 1968 and exploited the... Read more... |
Leonard Cohen: Turning the Darkness Into BeautyFriday, 11 November 2016
Leonard Cohen, who has died at 82, was one of those artists born with a wisdom and maturity that cut deep into the baby-boomer youth culture of his times. He provided the perfect antidote to the innocent optimism of the 1960s, a vision shot through... Read more... |
Howard Davies: An AppreciationThursday, 27 October 2016
Howard Davies, the theatre director who has died at the too-early age of 71, may not have achieved the renown of many of his colleagues. He didn’t direct blockbuster musicals, rarely ventured into TV and film, and didn’t possess the signature style... Read more... |
Interview: Sir Neville Marriner and the I, Culture OrchestraSunday, 02 October 2016
We’re in Gdańsk for the launch of the I, Culture Orchestra (sounds like an Apple product, someone points out). The new outfit has Sir Neville Marriner as guest conductor, at 87, still on sparkling form. The orchestra has brought together young... Read more... |
Who's afraid of Edward Albee?Saturday, 17 September 2016
"I've always thought there's nothing worse than coming to the end of your life and realising that you haven't participated in it, and so I write about people who've done that to a certain extent." Edward Albee has died at the age of 88, having... Read more... |
Marni Nixon: 'It ended up being totally my voice'Monday, 25 July 2016
Singin’ in the Rain made much of those people in the movies whose work you don’t know you know. Set at the dawn of the talkies, it told of a star of the silent screen with the voice of a foghorn who relied on the angelic pipes of a trained singer... Read more... |
The wisdom and wit of Carla LaneWednesday, 01 June 2016
Carla Lane, who has died at the age of 87, was the first from Liverpool. Before Alan Bleasdale and Willy Russell, long before Jimmy McGovern, hers was the loudest Liverpudlian voice on television portraying ordinary working people's lives. From The... Read more... |
Prince, 1958-2016Friday, 22 April 2016
Prince Rogers Nelson was the most gloriously disruptive presence in popular culture from the very start to the very end. Everything about him was off kilter and wrong: it's not for nothing that the first major biography of him was called The Imp of... Read more... |
