Cultural News Today

She captured America’s most tumultuous moments and its biggest stars. The great photographer relives her Rolling Stone years – and the time she set fire to Patti Smith A nnie Leibovitz is standing by a photograph she took of Pont Neuf in Paris. It’s a swirling panoramic shot of the famous bridge, taken when she was a student and would roam the city’s streets camera in hand. One day, with a thrill, she realised she was standing where her idol, Henri Cartier-Bresson , once stood to take his own ghostly grey picture of the Seine crossing. Leibovitz’s homage to the great French photographer did not stop there. Her latest exhibition – Annie Leibovitz: The Early Years, 1970-1983 – also features a remarkable shot of Cartier-Bresson himself. The notoriously camera-shy Frenchman glares into her lens. “He wouldn’t let me photograph him,” says Leibovitz. “So I studied his route to work every day and planted myself on a bridge and waited. ‘You!’ he said, when he saw me. Then, ‘All right – take

AC-12 are back after a fevered two-year wait – and, as ever, not a scene, line or beat is wasted Have your say on the new series in our episode recap You at the back, sit up straight. And everyone put their listening ears on. Here’s the list of all the things you’re going to need to understand series five of Line of Duty, which has returned to our screens after a fevered two-year wait. 1. OCG stands for organised crime group (or gang, depending on how formal you want to be). Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HQ7YKA

Paul Bailey on the inspirational autobiography of a woman who survived rape and racism in the American south Paul Bailey is a British novelist and critic. Maya Angelou wrote her first book, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings , aged 40 . The paperback of the book was on the New York Times bestseller list for two years. If you want to know what it was like to live at the bottom of the heap before, during and after the American Depression, this exceptional book will tell you. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JSHFoG

Courtyard collage celebrating art gallery’s 30th anniversary created an optical illusion A whimsical collage in the courtyard of France’s Louvre art gallery had a short shelf life after a swarm of tourists and art lovers left it in shreds. The French artist JR and 400 volunteers had put the final touches to the huge collage on Friday to mark the 30th anniversary of the Louvre’s glass pyramid. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2K2QZGW

The Hydro, Glasgow Brendan O’Carroll and co cheerfully gurn their way through two hours’ of weak gags, unmemorable songs and wasted opportunities Mrs Brown’s Boys D’Musical? begins where Mrs Brown’s Boys D’Movie left off, and, after two hours of weak gags and weaker songs, Mrs Brown’s Boys d’audience – or this member at least – is certain it ought to have spent longer in d’rehearsal room. As in the film, Dublin’s stout-hearted stallholders have won their court case against developers who wished to close Moore Street market. But where to find the €75,000 legal costs? Mrs Brown (Brendan O’Carroll), matriarch of the fruit stall, has a plum idea: put on a musical and watch the dosh roll in. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2uC4Ucj

Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood voice support after singer seeks medical treatment Sir Mick Jagger’s Rolling Stones bandmates have expressed their support for the 75-year-old frontman after he announced he was pulling out of a tour of the US and Canada because of an undisclosed medical problem. Jagger, who follows a strict diet and fitness regime, said he was “devastated” to let down the band’s fans after he announced the group were postponing the North American leg of their tour on doctor’s orders. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2COrLWs

Images of one of 20th century’s great hoaxes are expected to fetch nearly £70,000 Photographs of what is considered to be one of the great hoaxes of the 20th century are expected to fetch nearly £70,000 when they are sold at auction. Pictures of the Cottingley Fairies were taken in July and September 1917 by the 16-year-old Elsie Wright and her nine-year-old cousin Frances Griffiths, in the village of Cottingley, near Bingley in West Yorkshire. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FEBZcQ

Cultural project in cooperation with US showcases artefacts from writer’s stay on island A restoration centre to preserve the work of Ernest Hemingway has opened in Cuba, highlighting an area of cooperation with the US even as bilateral relations between the old cold war foes have chilled again. Hemingway, who won the Nobel prize in literature in 1954, wrote some of his best-known works during the 21 years he lived at Finca Vigía, or Lookout Farm, now a museum in San Francisco de Paula on the outskirts of Havana. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HP8CI6

Peniche fortress was used to hold dissidents under Portugal’s dictatorship The guards have long abandoned their posts at Peniche fortress, leaving sentry duty to the seagulls and cormorants that speckle its ancient battlements. Around and beneath the birds are builders in hardhats and hi-vis vests, civil servants, the occasional architect and an old man who is delighted to see the most notorious political prison of the Portuguese dictatorship stir back to life as a stone-and-concrete testimony to its own many and varied cruelties. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JSxAYS

Sixteen years ago today Canto-pop idol and Hong Kong cinema icon Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing leapt to his death from his room at the Mandarin Oriental hotel in Hong Kong. His talent is still dearly missed by his fans worldwide.To mark the anniversary we revisit five enduring images of the star – in some of his best film roles, as Cheng Dieyi in Farewell My Concubine, Ho Po-wing in Happy Together and Yuddy in Days of Being Wild – and on stage, as winner of an amateur singing contest at the start of… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2YEzSON

Marisa Silver joins Deborah Treisman to read and discuss “Nawabdin Electrician,” by Daniyal Mueenuddin, from a 2007 issue of the magazine. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2U6dcIB

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Rachel Syme reviews the series finale of the HBO comedy “Broad City.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2YEmqKM

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From The New Yorker’s archive, pieces by Jill Lepore, Ginger Strand, Rebecca Mead, Anthony Burgess, Richard Brody, and Laura Miller, about the history of dystopian fiction and novels, including “Slaughterhouse-Five,” “The Handmaid’s Tale,” “A Clockwork Orange,” “The Plot Against America,” and “The Hunger Games.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FJ8t5F

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Finborough, London Bart and Alun Owen’s 1964 musical about a Liverpudlian dockside prostitute and her sailor beau gets a foot-stamping first professional revival The working-class British musical sounds like a contradiction in terms. It did once exist, however, and this show, with music and lyrics by Lionel Bart and a book by Alun Owen, was a popular example of the genre. Revived professionally for the first time since 1964, it inevitably seems a period piece but it survives through the vim and vigour of Matthew Iliffe’s production. It would be easy to poke fun at the show’s romanticism. Pat Casey, son of a socialist martyr, returns to Liverpool from a life at sea to find that his old flame, Maggie May, has become a dockside doxy. Their passion is rekindled but Casey puts it on hold to lead his fellow dockers in a strike and then sabotage a cargo of guns intended for a foreign oppressor. The show is palpably enthralled by its hero – always referred to by his surname – and Maggie, w

SWG3, Glasgow Originally planned to coincide with the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the National Theatre of Scotland’s night of cabaret and comedy was performed under a sombre cloud Imagine organising a wake only to find the corpse is not quite cold. Planned to finish at the hour the United Kingdom was due to leave the EU, Dear Europe is a theatrical cabaret about Scotland’s continental connections. Despite the nightclub air of SWG3, the mood of the National Theatre of Scotland production is one of resignation, if not quite defeat. The half-dozen acts begin in pantomimic mode with a piratical Tam Dean Burn considering the fate of Scottish waters. In Aquaculture Flagshipwreck, he gives extravagant renditions of poems by Matt McGuinn and Tom Leonard while encouraging us to throw scrunched-up pages from the Financial Times at an inflatable salmon and slipping in barbed remarks about a Scottish fish industry substantially owned by Norway . Continue reading... from Culture | The Guard

On the eve of the final series, 10 of its stars including Carice van Houten, Jonathan Pryce and Gemma Whelan reflect on what it’s meant to them Now filming Sky series Temple and a film called The Glass House . Has had a child with partner, fellow actor Guy Pearce Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HNBGQr

Jonah Hill’s ability to switch from fast-talking clown to serious commentator has made him an unusual member of the Hollywood in-crowd. But then the actor turned director has always been a game changer Jonah Hill is in a moment of reinvention. At least, that’s what people keep telling him, usually with an eyebrow raised, as though his evolution from schlubby comedy star to sensitive indie director might be just another joke. It’s been more than a decade since Hill became famous as Superbad ’s X-rated doodler, a fast-talking clown voted Most Likely to Get Hit by a Cop Car. Since then, he’s earned two best supporting Oscar nominations (for Moneyball and The Wolf of Wall Street ) and yet audiences still seem to approach his serious roles tentatively, as though he might pop out and splat a pie in their face. The question isn’t just: is it time to take him seriously, it’s why is taking him seriously so hard? “Anyone who knew me was very surprised that this first half of my life went the

The Italian film-maker’s third movie, Happy As Lazzaro, is being hailed as visionary. Here she discusses her childhood in rural Umbria and why her work is always political As a child, Italian film-maker Alice Rohrwacher would accompany her parents on road journeys, often at night, transporting the produce of the family beekeeping business. Whenever they arrived somewhere, she would sit in the dark and wonder where she was. “I’d have to work it out from what I could hear, not from what I could see, so I’d listen to the place and the information would enter my mind – and then I’d open my eyes.” That, she says, is why her three feature films all start at night, to put her viewer in the same position. “You have to imagine a world, and then compare the world you imagine with the world outside.” The universe of Alice Rohrwacher’s films – that’s “Alice” pronounced “A-lee-che” – sometimes resembles the world as we know it, but pure imagination has increasingly played a part. Her debut, Corpo

The American artist on transcendental meditation, voice memos and Russian Doll Born in Kent in 1967, the artist Sarah Morris grew up in Rhode Island and now lives in New York. She studied at Brown and Cambridge universities, and is known for her abstract geometric paintings and non-narrative films on architecture and the city. She has had solo exhibitions in Berlin, Paris, Frankfurt and Bologna, and in 2001 received a Joan Mitchell Foundation award for painting . Morris’s new show, Machines Do Not Make Us Into Machines , will be at White Cube Bermondsey, London, from 17 April to 30 June. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JPlu2D

AC-12 are on the hunt for new corrupt coppers in Jed Mercurio’s police thriller. Plus Chris Packham visits humpback whales in Blue Planet Live. Here’s the best TV to watch this evening 8pm, BBC One Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2WFHJtL

Adrian Dunbar talks about the flaws of his character, who had always been a bastion of probity, as Jed Mercurio’s series returns to TV When hit police drama Line of Duty returns to BBC One on Sunday evening, eager fans will have just one question on their minds: can Superintendent Ted Hastings, father figure to his police crew and deployer of excellent Ulster colloquialisms, really be H, the corrupt mastermind behind the evil deeds that fuel the show’s labyrinthine plot ? If he does turn out to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing, the loud noise you’ll hear across the land will be the breaking of thousands of hearts. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2CIxpJW

In an extract from her new book, poet and teacher Kate Clanchy recounts how a school poetry club enabled often traumatised pupils to find their inner voice • Read an interview with Kate Clanchy Thirty years ago, just after I graduated, I started training to be a teacher. I wanted to change the world and a state school seemed the best place to start. Certainly, it wasn’t a compromise or a stopgap career: I had no thought of being a writer then. Soon, I was much too busy to write, even if I had thought of it. Teacher training is hard, a crash course not so much in the study of education, but in the experience of school: in the taking of the register and the movement of chairs from room to room; in the flooding sounds of corridor and stairs; in the educational seasons, from the tempering heat of exam week to the crazy cosiness of Christmas; and, above all, in the terrifying confidence trick that is classroom discipline. It’s a bodily experience, like learning to be a beekeeper or an a

Hampstead; Menier Chocolate Factor; Vaudeville, London Debut playwright Ella Road conjures a potent dystopia, Penelope Wilton is perfection in a sharp David Hare revival, and Shakespeare’s Dark Lady finds her voice There is an extraordinary moment in The Phlebotomist when a character is given a low mark – 2.2 out of 10 – and the audience gasps in dismay. It is as if Stephen Hawking had been given a D for GCSE physics, or Simon Russell Beale awarded a single star for Hamlet . Except that this mark is for a complete genetic assessment – and the result means that all possibilities for the future have been changed. In her assured first play, Ella Road creates a coherent dystopia. By means of blood testing, everyone is measured for every possible challenge to health – diabetes, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s – and awarded an overall rating. It is chilling that this rapidly seems normal, though scarcely surprising – have we ever before been so obsessed with marking everything? Chilling, too, h

Tate Britain, London The artist’s heady London years are the backdrop to a show that struggles to locate a British influence on this singularly self-propelled genius Van Gogh loved Dickens. He wore a top hat on his daily walk to work from Brixton to Covent Garden. He rowed on the Thames, studied Turner and Constable in the National Gallery, even took the new underground railways. That he lived in London, on and off, between the spring of 1873 and the winter of 1876 still seems as surprising as Géricault painting the Epsom Derby and Canaletto working for nine years in Soho. But there is a crucial difference: Van Gogh was not yet a painter. He was only 20 when a posting came up at the London branch of Goupil, the French art dealer for whom he worked in The Hague. A thumbnail sketch of Westminster Bridge on the company’s headed notepaper is one of only three drawings that survive from Van Gogh’s time in England. Fired from Goupil, and from his Brixton boarding house, where he fell in l

Patricia Clarkson’s homicide cop is the enigma in the director’s inspired reworking of a Martin Amis crime novel Is there any voice in modern British cinema more singular or distinctive than that of Carol Morley? From the confessional revelations of The Alcohol Years , through the heart-breaking docudrama of Dreams of a Life , to the spine-tingling swoon of The Falling , Morley has proved herself an unflinchingly adventurous film-maker – what Werner Herzog would call “a good soldier for cinema”. In her latest film, her most ambitious to date, she takes a neo-noir murder mystery and turns it into a quasi-metaphysical rumination upon life, the universe and everything. It’s a feat she undertakes with the gusto of one who is unafraid to fall, conjuring a trail of iridescent movie magic as she sets her sights on the stars. “You can tell a lot by looking,” says astrophysicist Jennifer Rockwell (Mamie Gummer), a phrase that reverberates throughout this shimmering puzzle, matched and mirrore

Royal Opera House; Linbury theatre, London Netrebko and Kaufmann turn tricky Verdi into box-office gold. Plus, a memorable outing for Handel’s Berenice For a few hours the UK was the envy of the world. Incredible but true, at least for the musically interested. The combined forces of a fated opera, two superstars and pairs of tickets changing hands illegally for the price of a small car would stir excitement in any circumstance. Verdi’s La forza del destino is in itself an event: complex, bumpy, long; an exploration of war, prejudice and religion streaked with bizarre comedy, laced with superstition, glistering with orchestral brilliance and vocal challenge. Recalled through the theatrics of the past week, that first night of the Royal Opera’s new Forza takes on the air of a febrile mirage, with opera’s most prized pair – the Russian soprano Anna Netrebko and German tenor Jonas Kaufmann – rising from the haze like surreal visions. Both showed up and sang in peak, corporeal form,

The pop great, who died last week aged 76, photographed in 1970, just as his initial creative burst was ending In 1970, when Dezo Hoffman produced this stylised portrait of Scott Walker, the 27-year-old singer was, as he would later admit, entering a long period of creative decline. Having been a reluctant pop star in the mid-1960s as lead singer of the Walker Brothers, a trio dubbed “the American Beatles”, he had embarked on a singular solo career as a balladeer whose style encompassed American show tunes and the more expressive songs of his hero, the Belgian chansonnier Jacques Brel . In retrospect, Walker’s early solo albums are among the greatest, and most unlikely, second acts of 1960s pop stardom. Scott (1967), Scott 2 (1968) and Scott 3 (1969) sold surprisingly well despite being willfully out of step with the psychedelic experimentalism of the time. In 1969, he was even given his own BBC series, Scott, on which he sang Broadway standards and Brel ballads as well as his own

Ginny Hogan humorously lists April Fools' Day pranks that Trump might like, such as spending our nation’s Social Security funds on three billion water balloons, taping a sign that says “Nuke me” onto Kim Jong Un’s back, and more. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FLJFv0

The Attorney General’s summary reported no conspiracy, but serious newsrooms and journalists did the job they are supposed to do, Steve Coll writes.  from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FNEHOl

Osita Nwanevu writes about the efforts in Congress by the Democratic Party to address climate change. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2OBbOaW

From a midwife in the 18th century to a labour ward in London in the 1970s, Sarah Knott’s reading suggestions for Mother’s Day What do we read to find out about other mothers’ lives? Sarah Moss blends history and fiction stylishly in Night Waking , which I picked up a little feverishly with an infant close at hand, looking for something clever and non-prescriptive. In the 1870s, a nurse travels to a remote Scottish island where infant mortality is desperately high. She brings her modern medicine, but not much understanding of island life, to hardscrabble homes. In the novel’s present day, a new mother in Scotland, an academic on a working holiday, digs up one of those infant skeletons. Her attempts to cope with small children, and with a husband whose parenting plays second fiddle to his work, unfold next to her struggle to understand what happened to the buried baby. “Safe delivered of a very fine Daughter”. We go back even further, to 18th-century Maine, in the hands of historian L

Singer ‘devastated’ but expects to make full recovery and tells fans to keep tickets Sir Mick Jagger has said he is “devastated” to let down fans after the Rolling Stones announced they were postponing a tour of the US and Canada while the frontman seeks medical treatment. The singer, 75, has been told by doctors that he cannot go on tour at the moment but has been advised that he is expected to make a full recovery. No further details of his condition were given. A statement from the group said: “Unfortunately today the Rolling Stones have had to announce the postponement of their upcoming US/Canada tour dates – we apologise for any inconvenience this causes those who have tickets to shows but wish to reassure fans to hold on to these existing tickets, as they will be valid for rescheduled dates, which will be announced shortly. “Mick has been advised by doctors that he cannot go on tour at this time, as he needs medical treatment. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guard

Algeria, Morocco, Mauritania and Tunisia on Friday swallowed their differences and presented a joint bid to secure coveted UN heritage status for couscous, UNESCO announced. from https://ift.tt/2YAT3sJ

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Alexandra Schwartz writes about the influence of the French filmmaker Agnès Varda, who died on Friday, at the age of ninety. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2U4OwjR

By Park Jin-haiDuring a recent live television concert, the members of K-pop girl group Dreamcatcher threw away their high heels between songs and danced barefoot as they performed their song Chase Me.On another show in March, girl group Mamamoo took to the stage wearing sweatshirts and sneakers during a performance of their song Waggy, while the music video for girl group Loona’s new song Butterfly shows members wearing trouser suits and includes women of other races and different body shapes… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2HP9tZs

Doreen St. Félix on Tyler Perry and his most famous character, Madea. Perry has said that his latest move, “A Madea Family Funeral,” will be the character’s final appearance. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2CJkkjq

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Richard Brody writes about the movies of the first few months of 2019, including “Ash Is Purest White,” “Birds of Passage,” “Black Mother,” and ”Us.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2I29U1U

Tim Burton’s overcomplicated remake of a beloved classic lacks emotional punch It says something about the extravagant visual impact of Dumbo that the flying baby elephant is routinely upstaged by his backdrop. Tim Burton’s live-action remake of the Disney classic fills in the spaces of the deliberately understated original watercolour animation with a noisy fanfare of pizzazz and spectacle. There’s plenty of typically Burtonesque camerawork – the lens that peers upwards, with a mixture of fear and wonder, before hurtling skywards like a firework. And there’s a lot to take in, even before the action shifts from the itinerant circus troupe (which served as the setting for the original story) to the steampunk, Coney Island-style amusement park, which hosts an explosive, all-new climax. Even the skies are magnificent, appropriately so, given Dumbo’s skill set. The circus train chugs across country under candyfloss clouds and synthetic sunsets that have the palette of a children’s part

Volume three of Smith’s Seasonal Quartet offers a powerful vision of lost souls in a divided Britain Following on from 2016’s Autumn and 2017’s Winter , the third novel in Ali Smith’s projected quartet is named after the season of new life, but it’s a bleaker, darker book than its predecessors. Written and published at speed, all three have tacked close to current events; the divisions crystallised by the EU referendum that opened Autumn have only hardened over the past three years, while beyond our small island conflict and climate change force ever more people from their homes. And yet, fittingly for a writer who over a quarter-century career has relished contradiction and oxymoron, the novel gradually reveals its kernel, like a seed unfurling in darkness, to be one of hope. “True hope,” one character says, is “actually the absence of hope.” Smith’s genius in these three books has been to use art and literature to navigate through the froth of the present moment with such a light

Wanstead Flats, London Some great performances - including a surprise appearance by Blur - are marred by too long watching roadies milling around Damon Albarn’s Brexit strategy was striking. The Africa Express co-founder had planned to mark the UK lurching out of Europe on 29 March by defiantly staging one of his organisation’s wilfully international, multicultural celebrations just down the road from where he spent his early boyhood years, in Waltham Forest, London’s inaugural borough of culture for 2019. The non-events in parliament have changed the storyline, and so Albarn finds himself peering out at a packed crowd inside a big top on the edge of Epping Forest, with Britain still clinging on to membership of the EU. “We’re in a period now where everything is make-believe,” he remarks, from under a blue baseball cap. “It’s like Danny Dyer said – it’s all a great mad riddle.” Since it formed 14 years ago, Africa Express has always been predicated on collaborations between weste

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In this regular feature series on some of the most talked-about films, we examine the legacy of classics, re-evaluate modern blockbusters, and revisit some of the most memorable lines in film. We continue this week with The Wolf of Wall Street , the 2013 film by Martin Scorsese.Martin Scorsese films fall into two camps: those about people trying to be good (see Silence or Kundun) and those about people trying to be bad (see Goodfellas or The Departed).Say what you like about the former, but he… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2HOwcEX

To celebrate 30 years since Like a Prayer, producers Patrick Leonard and Stephen Bray discuss the creation of her controversial opus March 1989, I open a large record envelope and a waft of patchouli oil hits my nostrils. Inside is the new Madonna album. The cover art features hippy beads and her crotch in jeans. This image is a nod to her mother, a devout Catholic of French-Canadian stock, who covered up their Sacred Heart statue when a woman came round the house wearing zip-up jeans. “In Catholicism you are born a sinner … the sin is within you the whole time,” Madonna said at the time. Dedicated to the memory of her mother, Like a Prayer explores the impact of her Catholic girlhood, disappointment in love and transformation of self. Compared to the sugar-sweet True Blue, this is a startling reinvention. During recording, from September 1988 to January 1989 at Johnny Yuma studios in LA, Madonna was at the worst point in her marriage to Sean Penn. She had filed for divorce the prev

Adam Rotstein writes a humorous speech from a therapist who finally joins Twitter and begins following her client. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2uAjmRZ

The debut novelist struggled to find books about women like her, so she wrote one. She talks about interracial dating, white middle-class publishing and her love for social media A fortnight ago the writer Candice Carty-Williams was talking to a man on a dating app. They began to discuss meeting up, then out of the blue, he announced: “I like really strong ebony women and I want them to dominate me.” “This has happened to me, like, 100 times,” Carty-Williams says with surprising cheerfulness. “He was a white man. It’s only now that I’m old and wise enough to understand my value that I didn’t take that forward. The younger me – the girl growing up believing that black girls are not desirable except for sex – would have entertained that for a long time.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JTY2RZ

Celebrities pick up a brush in the latest Bake-Offification of genteel British pastimes Remember Watercolour Challenge? Competitive tea-time Channel 4 painting show, lots of British retirees with the cheapest possible haircut holding easels up against unseasonable breezes, judged by a local artist-in-residence and overseen by Hannah Gordon? Tonally quite close to watching cricket, in the combination of burbling, quiet chit-chat and enforced breaks for tea? Wasn’t gripping exactly but your grandad liked to fall asleep to it? Closest thing the late 90s/early 00s really ever had to ASMR? Remember that? Well, now we have Celebrity Painting Challenge (Thu, 8pm, BBC One). Alongside the likes of Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen – still in his difficult detective-who-keeps-getting-foiled-by-Jack-the-Ripper bearded phase, I’m sad to say – there’s Jane Seymour, Phil Tufnell, George Shelley, Josie d’Arby and Amber Le Bon, who is always introduced as “DJ Amber Le Bon” the way you assume Ben Kingsley insi

Friends, we are gathered here today to honour those Marvel superheroes we lost. Or, more aptly, worry about the ones probably about to exit.In last year’s mega-epic Avengers: Infinity War , cosmic villain Thanos wiped out half of galactic existence with one apocalyptic snap of his Infinity Gauntlet, powered by six all-powerful Infinity Stones. And going halfsies on a universal scale meant a bunch of our favourite do-gooders went bye-bye, disintegrating into ash and leaving fans in a nervous… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2V4U227

From the American Revolution to Dunkirk, the Reformation to the Weimar republic – leading historians help us understand the forces at play in our divided world “Fromage not Farage”, “I’ve Seen Better Cabinets at Ikea”: the signs at the Put It to the People march were particularly British in their humour. The present crisis in the United Kingdom is, however, no laughing matter. It reflects very real social and political problems and deep divisions about the future of the country. The argument over remain or leave is also between the winners and losers in globalisation. In the 1960s former US secretary of state Dean Acheson said Britain had lost an empire and was yet to find a role. For a time it appeared Britain could be the pivot of Europe and the Atlantic world. Britain would be part of Europe on its own terms but also have a special relationship with the United States, with the British acting, as Harold Macmillan said, as the Greeks to the Americans’ Romans. Membership of the E

The children’s author and Radio 1 DJ on embarassing train trips and his obsession with Ainsley Harriott Born in London, James, 33, won best male presenter at the Student Radio Awards in 2005. Two years later he was presenting Radio 1’s Early Breakfast show. In 2018, he took over the prestigious Radio 1 Breakfast Show from Nick Grimshaw. James also writes children’s books with fellow presenter Chris Smith. The third in the series, Kid Normal And The Shadow Machine , has just been published. James lives in London with his wife, writer Bella Mackie. Which living person do you most admire, and why? Michael Palin. He’s managed to master several disciplines. He’s also proved that being nice doesn’t mean boring. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2TMmhBa

The Man Like Mobeen star on his political aspirations, infiltrating Hollywood and reacting to Christchurch Former teacher Guz Khan is recalling the time he legged it out of an A-level class. He had organised an interview about his fictional character Mobeen, after the two comedy videos he’d posted online had caught the eye of his local news programme in the West Midlands. “I asked the teacher in the next classroom: ‘Yo, listen, you’ve got to hold it down, make sure this lot don’t beat each other up,’’’ he says. “I ran out to do the interview. At that point I’d done a couple of Mobeen videos but I wasn’t a YouTuber by any means because I was a teacher. I was marking books, feeding the family – that was real life.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2I1dsS3

Eric Lach writes about the millennial, openly gay mayor of South Bend, who has recently received a wave of attention and seems to have chosen an enemy in Vice President Mike Pence. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Yzj2ka

Shaj Mathew on “The Twice-Born,” a piercing memoir about India’s identity crisis, by Aatish Taseer. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2TIVztt

With huge audience growth forecast, the race is on to lead podcast distribution Podcasting is experiencing a Netflix moment. Global hits – from the ground-breaking Serial to Up and Vanished, and TV crossovers such as Dirty John – and Spotify’s plan to spend up to $500m on leading producers have made podcasts a hot media property. Global monthly podcast listener figures are forecast to grow more than six-fold, from 287 million in 2016 to 1.85 billion in 2023, according to the Ovum research company Ovum. In the UK, Ofcom says that nearly 6 million people tune into a podcast each week, double the number of five years ago. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2UbtKz6

A year after addiction and a drink-driving conviction drove them apart, the nation’s favourite double act talk failure, friendship and therapy Ant and Dec stand nose-to-nose, waltz, tie each other’s ties and josh as if they’ve never been apart. Then, photos done, they sit down to talk, and within five minutes Declan Donnelly is in tears. This is the first interview the pair have given since announcing their comeback last December. More significantly, it’s their first interview since they stopped performing as a team in March last year, after Anthony McPartlin smashed into two cars in south-west London while under the influence of alcohol. A number of people were treated for minor injuries at the scene, and one child passenger was taken to hospital for a checkup. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2U74zO2

Genre-bending acts Radiohead and The Cure led a British invasion into Brooklyn on Friday night to take their spots in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.American folk rock legend Stevie Nicks became the first woman inducted twice – having already earned a spot in the rock pantheon as a member of Fleetwood Mac – during a gala concert at New York’s Barclays Centre to celebrate the seven 2019 honorees.Heavy metal group Def Leppard, pop experimentalists Roxy Music and English psychedelic rock harmonists… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2uAOa5m

Troy Patterson reviews Jordan Peele’s “Twilight Zone” reboot, which features Kumail Nanjiani, Tracy Morgan, and Adam Scott. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2JPpbFA

Anthony Lane writes a humorous reflection on Brexit, on the day that the United Kingdom was supposed to leave the European Union. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2UmFii3

A new fly-on-the wall documentary about US President Donald Trump's disgraced advisor Steve Bannon reveals his grandiose aspirations and self-regard, as well as his limitations. from https://ift.tt/2UebOTD

Amy Davidson Sorkin on Theresa May’s desperate attempts to salvage her deal and avoid a No Deal Brexit, even as the chaos in Parliament and the disagreement over the Irish border continue. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FKB4IM

Richard Brody recommends the 1957 film “Fear Strikes Out,” which is based on the ballplayer Jimmy Piersall’s memoir of the same name and is available to stream on Amazon Prime and iTunes. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FAhXjw

Sasha Frere-Jones writes about the Rolling Stones’s Altamont Speedway concert, which resulted in the murder of Meredith Hunter and is the subject of a new photo book by the photographer Bill Owens, “Bill Owens: Altamont 1969.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2CI5nye

Nicolas Cage was married for the fourth time last weekend – for four days anyway, before calling it off.According to court documents obtained by People Magazine and Entertainment Tonight, the actor and make-up artist Erika Koike applied for a marriage license in Las Vegas on Saturday. But by Wednesday Cage had filed for an annulment, also in Las Vegas.Nicolas Cage Seen Arguing with Erika Koike While Applying for Marriage License Before Annulment https://t.co/Gf1mZmeptA— People (@people) March… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2HW95HQ

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Andrea K. Scott writes about the photographer Paul Mpagi Sepuya’s new show, “The Conditions,” at Team Gallery, through April 13th, and the queer history of the portrait studio. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2HW3XU6

On The New Yorker Radio Hour, with David Remnick, Susan B. Glasser and Masha Gessen tease out the implications of the Mueller report, and Patrick Radden Keefe explains how Purdue Pharma flooded America with OxyContin. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2uzvjY7

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Richard Brody writes about the life and work of the filmmaker Agnès Varda, who died this week, at age ninety, and the legacy of her films such as “Faces Places,” “Cleo from 5 to 7,” “Jane B. pour Agnès V.,” and more. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2UcN2TO

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Jetti Allen illustrates a humorous list of items that Silicon Valley entrepreneurs can use to scam people. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2TLiUdK

Juliana Margulies speaks to FRANCE 24 about her new medical thriller “The Hot Zone”, a new campaign tries to curtail wine drinking and France bucks a global trend by having lots of babies. Also, the Louvre pyramid celebrates its 30th birthday. from https://ift.tt/2uwmYof

When the Louvre’s new entrance – a glass pyramid – was first unveiled 30 years ago, many in France were shocked by its revolutionary design. But “la pyramide” has been key to making the Louvre the most-visited museum in the world. from https://ift.tt/2V3f7dj

Film director Agnès Varda's 'work is always personal, always compassionate'. An icon of French cinema, beloved as much for her contribution to the French New Wave as for her later documentary work, Varda has died at the age of 90, the filmmaker's family announced on Friday. France 24's Olivia Salazar-Winspear discusses the legend and her work. from https://ift.tt/2HNnFlF

French film director Agnès Varda, a trailblazer of the French New Wave and feminist activist, has died aged 90, her family said on Friday. from https://ift.tt/2WytNBo

France's southern Drôme region is a land of inspiration for artists. It's home to a string of medieval citadels nestled high over the valley. Some were still in ruins until around six decades ago, when painters and sculptors gave them a renaissance. Since then, subsequent generations have worked hard to preserve their beauty. Meanwhile, every week in Chabrillan, residents take turns to look after the botanical garden, while the forest of Saoû attracts geologists from around the world. from https://ift.tt/2WwskM0

France has been grappling with its own version of a blackface scandal after activists blocked a theatre performance at the Sorbonne university in Paris involving actors with black masks. from https://ift.tt/2Wt3qwX

Facing extinction, the world’s oldest morris dancing group voted to admit women to their ranks. A welcome step forward – or a slight to a harmless expression of masculinity? My mouth was dry, my heart pounded furiously. I had two silk sashes crossed over my chest and was being led towards my first public morris dance by a bunch of elderly men who jangled like a herd of exotic cows. On a drizzle-soaked pavement outside the Church Inn in Mossley, Greater Manchester, we took our places like Lancastrian matadors, brandishing wooden sticks instead of swords. I had been building up to this moment for six months. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FL0INU

Hollywood star married Erika Koike in Las Vegas on Saturday Cage’s 2002 marriage to Lisa Marie Presley lasted 108 days The Hollywood actor Nicolas Cage has officially filed an annulment from his wife of four days. Related: Nicolas Cage: ‘If I don’t have a job to do, I can be very self-destructive’ Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FJ8tnx

Leicester Square theatre, London Netflix’s Vagabond star teams up with Man Like Mobeen’s Khan to headline a mischievous night of smart gags When the US standup Mo Amer first toured the UK, it was on the Muslim comedy bill Allah Made Me . There are echoes of that show in Persons of Interest, which isn’t about religion, but is about being brown and viewed askance by the white mainstream. On this tour, Amer teams up with the UK comic and Man Like Mobeen star Guz Khan . They are supported by New York DJ/standup Cipha Sounds and American-Indian-Iranian comic Omid Singh. Perhaps unsurprisingly, most of the laughs derive from cultural difference, from Cipha Sounds’ gags about big Puerto Rican families via Khan’s primer in South Asian stereotypes to Amer’s uptight set piece about how to prepare hummus. That familiar brand of humour is deployed with an expert touch here. Additional heat is supplied by Sounds’ hip-hop atmospherics – all hype and honking klaxons – throughout the show. Contin

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In this September 2018 conversation, the film-maker reflected on her discretion, daring and how she wanted to be remembered • Peter Bradshaw: Agnès Varda, the eternally youthful soul of world cinema What are the strongest memories of your childhood? My parents named me Arlette. and I changed it to Agnès when I was young. I didn’t like it because I don’t like names with “ette” – you know, it looks like a little girl’s name. Jumping, charming and jumping. I didn’t feel like being like this. So I chose Agnès. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2uBYRUU

Exclusive: TV duo discuss hurt and anger of their troubled 2018 Ant and Dec considered splitting up after Ant McPartlin’s conviction for drink-driving last year, the pair have told the Guardian in an exclusive and wide-ranging interview. McPartlin was more than twice over the legal limit when he smashed into two other cars in south-west London last March. He was driving his mother, and both cars he hit contained children. McPartlin was fined £86,000 , believed to be a British record for drink-driving, and banned from driving for 20 months. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2TEr2Nb

The man dubbed the Indiana Jones of the art world says he offers thieves ‘a way out’ The ring at the door of the modest east Amsterdam apartment came late in the day on Thursday 14 March. On the doorstep stood two men “with contacts in the underworld”, Arthur Brand recalls, and with them a large, rectangular package. Eagerly, Brand removed the covering and examined the contents: Buste de femme (Dora Maar) , a portrait by Pablo Picasso of his mistress. Unsigned because it was never sold by the painter, it bore in its bottom-left corner the date he completed it, 26 April 1938, and was worth an estimated €25m (£21.5m). Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JQGZAr

One hundred copies of print to go on sale to raise funds to save London music bar from closure Jeremy Deller, the Turner prize-winning conceptual artist, has created a print to commemorate “Brexit Day” which reads simply: “Farage in Prison”. One hundred copies of the artwork, which are printed on silkscreen, will be sold at £110 each. They will raise money for the crowdfunder to save central London bar The Social from closure. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FK0jev

The Canadian actor had forged a lengthy career in cult TV shows and films, appearing in three James Bond movies Actor Shane Rimmer, who voiced the character of pilot Scott Tracy in Thunderbirds, has died. The official Gerry Anderson website carried the news , saying that the death of the 89 year old had been confirmed by his widow Sheila Rimmer. Rimmer died at home in the early hours of 29 March. No cause of death has been given. Rimmer, who was born in Toronto in 1929 and moved to the UK in the 1950s, played the leader of the Thunderbirds crew in 32 episodes produced between 1964 and 1966. The actor also contributed his voice to other Gerry Anderson projects including Joe 90 and Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, and appeared in person in the Anderson’s live action project UFO. Behind the scenes, Rimmer also wrote episodes of Captain Scarlet, Joe 90, The Secret Service and The Protectors. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FJkidc

Music star’s memorial takes place in Bocking, Essex, with fans lining procession route Music fans from around the world have lined the streets of Essex for the funeral of Prodigy star Keith Flint, with festival flags flying and music playing over loudspeakers outside the church. The much-loved vocalist was found dead at his home in Essex on 4 March at the age of 49. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2CJnxPY

MEP claims some House of European History staff subjected to ‘slave labour’ The EU-funded House of European History, a £47m museum celebrating the continent’s integration, has been accused of forcing contract staff to work seven days a week and ask for permission to drink water. MEP Dennis De Jong has claimed that staff have endured bans on sitting, speaking or drinking during their 10-hour shifts looking after visitors. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FLa6Ba

FACT, Liverpool Cinderella shuns her prince and Freudian sexism is unmasked in an empowering show about myth and misogyny Fairytales are not known for complex female characters. Usually, they are beautiful but powerless, awaiting salvation via matrimony. Presumably wearied by the vacuous central female, several writers have penned disruptive alternatives. Red Riding Hood has been recast as the wolf’s lover by Angela Carter and the wolf’s murderer by Carol Ann Duffy , and Merseyside Women’s Liberation Movement when they re wrote several traditional tales in 1972 . The same organisation saw Snow White unionise the dwarfs and Rapunzel escape using her own hair. It is in this canon of subversive sisters that Ericka Beckman and Marianna Simnett ’s protagonists find their place. Although their work is separated by nearly 30 years, both artists rally against the restrictive structure of myth, creating video works with strong, decisive women who forge their own destinies. Four of their fi

The Oscar winner who built a career on acclaimed literary adaptations such as his masterpiece "The Tin Drum" brought international recognition to German cinema. At 80 years old, his work continues to resonate. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://www.dw.com/en/volker-schlöndorff-tin-drum-director-turns-80/a-48101418?maca=en-rss-en-cul-2090-rdf

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Peter Kuper’s Daily Cartoon considers a report by William Barr. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2OAtBiC

John Cassidy writes about the I.P.O. of the ride-hailing tech company Lyft and about the history of the dot-com stock bubble. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2YBbSvK

The full video to Rammstein's new single "Deutschland," the first in a decade, is for some a cinematic journey through the history of violence and fascism in "Germania"; for others, it's merely tasteless exploitation. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2HZLWEm

Spasmodic dysphonia groups criticise actor for crediting disability as inspiration for her doppelganger’s voice in Jordan Peele film Two organisations in the US have attacked Jordan Peele’s acclaimed follow-up to Get Out, Us, for furthering negative attitudes towards disability. The National Spasmodic Dysphonia Association (NSDA) and the nonprofit group RespectAbility have taken issue with lead actor Lupita Nyong’o’s recent revelation that she used the symptoms of spasmodic dysphonia as the inspiration for the strained voice of her murderous doppelganger character in the film. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2I0QcTV

Sotheby’s sells Study for a Head 1952, important work seen in public only once A Francis Bacon painting considered one of his most important left in private hands, part of his terrifying “screaming pope” series, is to appear at auction. Sotheby’s said on Friday it was selling Study for a Head 1952, part of a collection inspired by Diego Velázquez’s portrait of Pope Innocent X , which helped to establish Bacon’s reputation in the 1950s. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2JOsOf8

Barbican, London Murphy has an astonishing athleticism playing both man and crow in an adaptation of Max Porter’s story of grief Cillian Murphy and Enda Walsh have teamed up to bring Max Porter’s extraordinary mix of novel and poem about grief to the stage. Adapted and directed by Walsh, the result is highly theatrical – sometimes excessively so – but Murphy’s performance, as both a bereaved husband struggling to write a book about Ted Hughes and as the crow who invades the writer’s home and his imagination, is a thing of wonder. Murphy proved in Walsh’s play Ballyturk that he is a prodigiously athletic actor. I remember him jumping on to a high ledge with the agility of a gazelle. Here he is one moment the sad dad thinking of his dead wife and caring anxiously for his two children (David Evans and Leo Hart); the next he becomes the visiting crow who is a mix, as novelist Kirsty Gunn wrote, of analyst and amanuensis. Murphy achieves the transition by donning a hooded, monk-like bl

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Italy disgraced former leader has been oddly untouched by two decades of cinematic skewerings. With Loro, the nation’s most gifted film-maker takes aim One night in 2001, flicking through the TV channels during a year of study in Italy, I chanced on an advert in which a woman in a swimming costume came into a room with a pool. She dived in and began to swim from one end to the other. It was unclear what the advert would be for – swimming costumes? pools? – so my flatmates and I quickly made bets. Finally, the nubile woman reached the end of the pool and swam up to … a plate of raw mushrooms, picking one of them up and nuzzling it. A caption and jingle closed off the enterprise, directing viewers to buy mushrooms. This was the year of the second electoral victory of Silvio Berlusconi, owner of Italy’s largest TV company, including three of the country’s seven TV channels. You can’t talk about Berlusconi without talking about television, and you can’t talk about Italian television wit