old age
Ismene Brown
This week the world-renowned Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch arrives in London - for the first time, without its towering creator. Last summer the German choreographer died at the age of 68. The company intends to continue, despite the dodgy track record for troupes formed around one singular giant vision to survive long without that magnet at the core. Bausch (1940-2009) was shy in person and had no need to publicise her work, but at Christmas 2001 I met her in her base in Wuppertal, and she looked back in detail over the surprising sources in her life for her innovative style of dance- Read more ...
aleks.sierz
Okay, now that you’re a citizen of Dystopia, and you’ve reached the regulation old age, it’s time to check into an approved care home. Please enter the Ark, and take your allotted bed. A government official will be with you in due course. Yes, that’s right, just take those pills and you will be fine. Will you be expecting visitors? Okay. Any problems, just ask Nurse. In Tamsin Oglesby’s satirical new drama, which opened last night at the National's Cottesloe space, the biblically named Ark is not a means of salvation but an instrument of euthanasia.We start with a family which, in its Read more ...
Veronica Lee
Anyone looking for a novel way into their PhD on how the British like to be entertained would do well to sit in the audience of the live version of Grumpy Old Women, a successful spin-off from the BBC television series where celebby femmes d’un certain age sit and moan about whatever takes their fancy. Students of British social mores will learn that what Brits love more than anything is a good old moan - and will even pay to hear someone else do it for them.One assumes that the gripes expressed on the TV version are the contributors’ own, but on stage it’s a scripted piece by Judith Holder Read more ...