The good, the bad and the ugly in books, exhibitions, cinema, TV, dance, music, podcasts and theatre.
Gently does it. The Fitzrovia Radio Hour takes us back to the droll and elegant world of light entertainment in the 1940s when the airwaves were full of racy detective shows and overheated melodramas about pushy Yorkshiremen and rogue Nazis. The show is set in a radio studio during a live performance and we watch
Ballet is a dying art, according to Jennifer Homans’s bestselling history of ballet, Apollo’s Angels. Ballet is a dying art, according to Jennifer Homans’s bestselling history of ballet, Apollo’s Angels. Sensationalist as it may sound, this claim is cogently argued at the end of the book, which turns dreary ballet history into an engaging narrative.
It’s sometimes intriguing to speculate, as you go to an opera in a fringe production of one kind or another, about how much messing around (used neutrally) this or that popular work can take. It’s sometimes intriguing to speculate, as you go to an opera in a fringe production of one kind or another, about
A frock that shocks, a terror-filled red coat and diamonds of seductive power are all promised next week in an alluring late-night series on Radio 3 (produced by Duncan Minshull). Listener, They Wore It gives us five 15-minute essays about clothes. Not a subject I would normally bother with, never being someone noted for my
Horizon (BBC2, Monday) asked, ‘What is reality?’ and didn’t really have an answer. Horizon (BBC2, Monday) asked, ‘What is reality?’ and didn’t really have an answer. Well, it seems nobody does, though plenty of physicists, mathematicians and astronomers are working on it. As the voiceover told us, ‘Once you have entered their reality, your reality
Penelope Curtis, director of Tate Britain, talks to Ariane Bankes about the planned revamp of the museum and 100 different ways of showing sculpture The evening after first meeting Penelope Curtis, director of Tate Britain, I bumped into a mutual friend who told me, only half-joking, that she could be frightening. Fair enough, I thought:
The question of what is art vexes the tax authorities as well as philosophers. Last month, the Art Newspaper reported the latest twist in a wonderful, long-running row. The European Commission has decided that two pieces of installation art — ‘Hall of Whispers’ by Bill Viola, and ‘Six Alternating Cool White/Warm White Fluorescent Lights/Vertical and
Simon Starling’s art often involves some form of recycling — his controversial ‘Shedboatshed’ won the 2005 Turner Prize – and his ‘new’ exhibition at Camden Arts Centre (until 20 February) is no different. Simon Starling’s art often involves some form of recycling — his controversial ‘Shedboatshed’ won the 2005 Turner Prize – and his ‘new’
Dotting through the list of composers’ anniversaries in 2011, I was struck both by the number of people mentioned and by the utter lack of fame of almost all of them. Dotting through the list of composers’ anniversaries in 2011, I was struck both by the number of people mentioned and by the utter lack
Although I am an admirer of Dulwich Picture Gallery, and like to support its generally rewarding exhibition programme, I will not be making the pilgrimage to see its latest show, Norman Rockwell’s America. Although I am an admirer of Dulwich Picture Gallery, and like to support its generally rewarding exhibition programme, I will not be
There’s gold out there. The search for lost masterpieces beguiles many a theatrical impresario but with it comes the danger that the thrill of the chase may convert a spirit of honest exploration into an obtuse reverence for the quarry. There’s gold out there. The search for lost masterpieces beguiles many a theatrical impresario but
Is Humperdinck’s Hänsel und Gretel an opera for children of all ages, or for grown-ups and for children, or mainly for grown-ups? I went to the Royal Opera’s revival of it just after Christmas, to a 12.30 matinée (there were several), which I took to be for the benefit of children, as well as possibly
You might be forgiven for thinking that the cuts to broadcasting have already been implemented, with nothing but Mozart on Radio 3 and the Bible on Radio 4 on Sunday. Meanwhile, we’ve discovered that the actor who played the unfortunate Nigel Pargetter in The Archers, Graham Seed, has lost 75 per cent of his income,
‘I want everyone to be as angry as I am,’ says Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, and I hope he succeeds for the thing that makes him so angry is one of the things that makes me most angry, too: the senseless eradication of the world’s fish stocks. ‘I want everyone to be as angry as I am,’
It’s not all politics at Westminster. There’s a pretty good think-tank scene too, with lectures on topics that you’re unlikely to read about in the newspapers. One took place today: the Adam Smith Institute hosted a lecture by Steven G. Horwitz, from St. Lawrence University, entitled “An Austrian perspective on the great recession of 2008-09”.
Although I stopped watching TV some years ago, films are a continuing solace and pleasure. Among the Christmas treats was a previously unseen Jack Nicholson movie, entitled The Bucket List. The plot revolves around two very different Americans, Nicholson and Morgan Freeman, both of whom are suffering from cancer and are given a mere matter
Damian Thompson highlights the gems among the prolific and pilloried composer’s nine million notes The extraordinary thing about Franz Liszt is that he remains one of the most famous composers of the 19th century despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of his music is forgotten — and likely to stay forgotten. He wrote enough
Some albums you love instantaneously, others you have to work at. And, just occasionally, an album comes along that you know that you will love if only you can hear it enough times. Except that you won’t. You will keep on playing it, and still you won’t really like it, and still you will keep
It’s that time of year. The great reckoning is upon us. Insurance is being renewed. Tax returns are being ferreted out. Roofing jobs are being appraised and budgeted for. And spouses are being trundled into central London for the annual session of dialysis at the theatre. It’s that time of year. The great reckoning is
Unless you’ve been living under a rock — in which case, keep it to yourself; I’m done with rocks — you’ll have already heard about 127 Hours. Unless you’ve been living under a rock — in which case, keep it to yourself; I’m done with rocks — you’ll have already heard about 127 Hours. It’s
In the absence of any operas to attend, I’ve been reading the most recent defence of ‘director’s opera’, a book with the characteristic title Unsettling Opera, by the American academic David J. Levin. In the absence of any operas to attend, I’ve been reading the most recent defence of ‘director’s opera’, a book with the
There’s been much grumbling in the shires about Radio 3’s 12-day Mozart marathon. There’s been much grumbling in the shires about Radio 3’s 12-day Mozart marathon. Why burden us with so much baroque? Where do you go if you can’t abide all those notes? But actually there’s something wonderfully cleansing about knowing that what you’re
The Radio Times now lists 72 channels, and that’s not all of them. The Radio Times now lists 72 channels, and that’s not all of them. No wonder television has to feed on itself, like a hungry tigress scoffing her cubs. In particular, it devours the past, so this week we had a Morecambe and
Although he was the leading portrait painter of Regency England, Thomas Lawrence (1769–1830) has somehow slipped beneath the catch-net of modern public recognition. Although he was the leading portrait painter of Regency England, Thomas Lawrence (1769–1830) has somehow slipped beneath the catch-net of modern public recognition. He was the son of a Bristol innkeeper, who
Harry Mount looks across the Dardanelles and sees yesterday’s weather today In Canakkale — the biggest town on the Dardanelles, where more than 130,000 British, Australians, New Zealanders and Turks were slaughtered in the 1915 campaign — Mark Wallinger, the 2007 Turner Prize winner, has dreamt up a clever little work about memory. On the
What do the following comedians have in common? Morecambe and Wise, Ronnie Barker, Frankie Howerd, Bob Monkhouse, Peter Sellers. They’re all dead, yes. But something else. None of them was knighted. Instead they were all made OBE, an honour Michael Winner once charmingly described as ‘what you get if you clean the toilets well at
The recent restoration of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis is now available for home viewing in three plush editions, in Eureka’s Masters of Cinema DVD series. The recent restoration of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis is now available for home viewing in three plush editions, in Eureka’s Masters of Cinema DVD series. Metropolis is the foundation of all subsequent
The King’s Speech is a joy, and I adore it. The King’s Speech is a joy, and I adore it. In fact, I love it so much that, if I could, I would take it home and put it down for a good school and wrap it up warm in the cold and, should it
It is characteristic of Wagner’s operas, in their remarkable urgency and depth, that initially one thinks they are dealing with one or another opposition, for instance, Power versus Love in the Ring, only to find, as one gets further into them, that they are very much more complicated than that, and often that what seems