Cultural News Today

Prophetic, frenetic and shockingly brutal, the film became a British classic. For its 40th anniversary, Mirren and other cast members relive their roles in the menacing gangland masterpiece It has been 40 years since the release of The Long Good Friday , a gangster film still revered as one of the best British movies of all time. Shot in London in the late 1970s and starring the late Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren, it told the story of an underworld boss trying desperately to stop the IRA from dismantling his empire. The backdrop for the film was the London Docklands, then mostly undeveloped. With corrupt city planners in his pocket, Hoskins’ character – the pugnacious, barrel-chested Harold Shand – attempts to woo the New York mafia into a partnership to transform the area, selling the idea to them with a speech during a trip up the Thames on his yacht. “Our country is not an island any more,” he snarls. “We’re a leading European state. And I believe this is the decade in which London

A new three-part documentary recalls the beginnings of the pandemic, and a close friend reminisces about her years with the Queen. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/39yVy5X

Musician Rebeca Omordia has spent years unearthing the classical music of a whole continent, culminating in the hugely successful African Concert Series While the Wigmore Hall has rightly garnered plaudits for keeping classical music alive during lockdown, another pioneering concert series has also beaten the odds with its series of online live events. The African Concert Series is the brainchild of my former duo partner, the pianist Rebeca Omordia. She has half-Romanian, half-Nigerian heritage. But while we would often discuss world-renowned Romanian classical musicians such as composer Georges Enescu, pianist Dinu Lipatti and conductor Sergiu Celibidache, when it came to Nigerian classical composers, we drew a blank. “There aren’t any,” said Rebeca. I told her there must be, and challenged her to find them. This was back in 2013, and her subsequent research has uncovered more than 200 composers of African art music, Nigerians among them. Continue reading... from Culture | The

Author Craig Taylor chooses memoir, poetry, history and photography by writers who have committed to the city’s streets, ready for its surprises and shocks New York City got into my blood. It’s a side effect when you spend years walking its streets, talking to hundreds of residents. It invaded my thoughts, colonised my reading list and still shows up, vividly, in my dreams. Related: New Yorkers by Craig Taylor review – extraordinary city stories Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sFt95R

This painfully worthy adaptation of former inmate Mohamedou Ould Salahi’s diary stars only good guys, and is hand-wringingly self congratulatory Any movie that reminds us of the ongoing civil rights scandal at the US’s extrajudicial detention camp at Guantánamo Bay should be a good thing: it’s still open for business right now , with 40 prisoners inside. The same goes for any reminder of the 9/11 terrorist outrage and the backlash of furious revenge it was designed to provoke, implanting a virus of rage and fear that threatens to live on in the American bloodstream like malaria. But I was disappointed by this well-meaning movie, based on the true story of Mohamedou Ould Salahi from Mauritania in north-west Africa. A former muhajideen anti-communist fighter in Afghanistan in the 1990s, who was picked up and handed over to the US authorities after 9/11 (with the Mauritanian government’s permission) and kept at Guantánamo Bay without charge or trial for a staggering 14 years, from 2002

The audio-only social network is like a conference in your headphones. Could it become something more? from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2QPqZ5r

Calls specific people out: ten letters. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3m8extl

Adam Wingard’s film reaffirms the franchise’s ability to waste talented actors, in this case including Alexander Skarsgård, Millie Bobby Brown, and Rebecca Hall. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2PKZ2eI

The American Taxpayer is a docile breed of Taxpayer. Not like those Swedish Taxpayers, who expect services to be ​free ​just because they’ve already paid for them. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3m6LYw2

As a local mosque announces news of daily deaths, three-year-old Antara does her best to find connection and joy in the midst of a coronavirus lockdown in Dhaka, Bangladesh. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3sytrLH

After coming out as a lesbian, aged 12, she suffered a horrendous attack at school. Now a successful actor, she is determined to help those wrestling with their identities Ruby Rose spent much of her childhood travelling around Australia with her mother, an aspiring artist, trying to make ends meet. They were poor, but they were unstoppable, says Rose. Her mother had sold their TV, so there were no dreams of becoming the Hollywood action star she is now, nor the model, presenter, DJ, VJ and campaigner she has been over the years. When Rose was a child, she just wanted to write. “I wanted to write a book for kids that were my age. I just wanted to have a way to communicate and speak to kids like me, who didn’t have someone,” she says, over Zoom. “I was just this kid who had no friends, who was super unpopular, got bullied and beaten up at school, and was like: ‘I’m going to be a famous writer.’” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sHm4l2

YouTube employees had called for removal of track which suggests targeting ‘Chinese neighbourhood’ YouTube has rejected a proposal from within the company to remove a video by successful Los Angeles rapper YG, which features lyrics about targeting Asian neighbourhoods for robbery. Employees had requested the 2014 track, Meet the Flockers, be removed, following the 16 March shooting in Atlanta that killed eight people, six of them Asian women, as well as a wider wave of anti-Asian hate crime in the US. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2PcPvgB

Damon Albarn, Idles, Jorja Smith, Kano, Wolf Alice and Honey Dijon will also appear at Live at Worthy Farm, a ticketed virtual event on 22 May The organisers of Glastonbury have announced that Coldplay , Damon Albarn , Haim , Idles , Jorja Smith , Kano , Michael Kiwanuka and Wolf Alice will perform at Live at Worthy Farm, a ticketed live-stream event to be broadcast on 22 May. The five-hour film, directed by Grammy-nominated film-maker Paul Dugdale, will be presented as an uninterrupted production, tracing the arc of what festival co-organiser Emily Eavis called “one continuous wild night” at the festival, via festival landmarks including the Pyramid stage, the stone circle and the notorious south-east nightclubbing corner. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31zDLY8

The bright mind who lit up Blindness at the Donmar and the National Theatre’s panto approaches each job like a mystery After Jessica Hung Han Yun ’s first professional gig as a lighting designer, she seriously considered leaving the industry. It was Tosca at the King’s Head theatre in London in 2017. “I remember feeling like I hadn’t done this show justice but I couldn’t figure out why. At that point I wasn’t confident in myself so I wasn’t confident in my ideas. I wanted to try things but was too scared to try them so I went for a safer option.” That taught her an important lesson: “to be brave in the way you design and the way you approach work.” If you fail, she adds, there is always another way of approaching lighting. “People always think of failure as negative. It’s not, it’s also positive because you learn from it.” Since that moment, Hung Han Yun has gone out of her way to take risks. At 27, she has already won huge acclaim for the imagination and beauty of her designs. Cont

Now in its fourth series, Kay Mellor’s show is like a candlelit bath – warm, comforting and good for the soul You know what you’re getting from a Kay Mellor drama, and The Syndicate (BBC One) is the writer/creator at her most Mellor-ish. Focusing on a different group of lottery-winners each series, the show has been plugging away for almost a decade, shifting its setting just enough to keep up with the times while sticking to its (cash-)winning formula. I find it irresistible, though I admit I’m a sucker for any drama that reaches its highest point of tension with an investigation into whether there is a specialist orthopaedic vet in Yorkshire’s east riding or not. Despite opening in glamorous, sun-drenched Monaco, with a loud, excitable group of mates shouting “Not like Scarborough, is it!” out of the window of a minibus, the action soon skips back three days to the meat and potatoes of the story, back at home in West Yorkshire. This time, the syndicate is made up of co-workers at a

I longed for novels about female desire - women empowered by sex and their expressions of lust. So I sat down and wrote my own The idea for my novel Insatiable emerged from a simple question: where were all the horny women? I knew that we were secretly legion. In fact, I suspected that I was surrounded by women, sitting on buses, standing in queues, staring out of the window and simultaneously entertaining all kinds of filthy daydreams. After all, millions of us had bought and read Fifty Shades of Grey. Even if half the sold copies were bought by people who wanted to mock it, that left millions of genuinely horny women unaccounted for – and buying the sequels. I was not transported in the way I had hoped; I did not find Christian sexy, I did not relish the BDSM and, most of all, I struggled to connect with the beautiful, blank lead character, Anastasia. She seemed similar to every other sort-of-horny woman I had seen on screen, a sexual object before she was a sexual subject, a perso

The rapper behind Montero (Call Me By Your Name) and Satan Shoes has fired back at conservative critics one by one It has been four days since Lil Nas X released the music video for Montero (Call Me By Your Name) and turned into the most controversial pop star on the planet. The video, which features the rapper sliding down a pole to hell before giving the devil a lap dance, has garnered criticism from conservative politicians and commentators, who say the song encourages devil worshiping and scandalizes young fans. In a note written to his younger self about the release, Lil Nas X (whose real name is Montero Lamar Hill) said he had created the video hoping to further normalize queerness. “I know we promised to never be ‘that’ type of gay person, I know we promised to die with the secret, but this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist,” he said. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sCvwGh

Her testimony brought a trafficker down ... the fate of a photographer’s assistant who was lured into prostitution is brilliantly pieced together There is a moment in this study of Edwardian sex trafficking when the murk of history parts at the sound of a voice. It is a voice so arrestingly poignant that the hidden briefly becomes visible. Picked up for soliciting on the streets of London, Lydia Harvey explains to police why, months before, she failed to solicit a customer on her first night working as a prostitute: “I was thinking too much of home,” she tells them. And there she is, vivid on the evening that a grim reality dawned on her: a girl too far from home to hope for rescue. Before she was trafficked to London via Argentina in 1910, Harvey was a photographer’s assistant in Wellington, New Zealand. She had come from a provincial home crowded with seven younger sisters and had already quit a position as a live-in maid. She was in search of the wider world. A fellow lodger in he

Industry body report shows 70% decline in visitor numbers at British attractions last year A “phenomenal” summer of culture in the UK without crowds, queues or inbound tourists beckons, tourism chiefs have promised, as new figures were published laying bare just how bad 2020 was. Bernard Donoghue, the director of the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA) , said there would probably not be another chance for people to experience the nation’s museums, galleries, zoos, castles, country houses and theme parks as they will be able to this year. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2O5Ihdw

With public art collections closed we are bringing the art to you, exploring highlights from across the country in partnership with Art UK. Today’s pick: The Martinique by Sally Ryan At first glance this work is easily mistaken in our collection’s spaces for one of renowned 20th-century British sculptor Jacob Epstein’s busts. Its creator is in fact the little known American sculptor Sally Ryan . This sculpture was gifted as part of a selection of 15 of Ryan’s works , presented to the town of Walsall in 1973 by Kathleen Garman (Epstein’s widow) who had grown up locally. We are, as far as we are aware, the only UK public museum collection that features Ryan’s work. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2Oeb3ZK

Display to include eggs commissioned by Russian tsars and Fabergé pieces owned by the Queen Three Imperial Easter eggs created by Carl Fabergé are being lent by Moscow to the UK for the first time as part of an exhibition exploring the often overlooked success in London of the tsars’ favourite jeweller. The V&A on Wednesday announced details of an exhibition, opening in November, that will display some of the most jaw-dropping ornaments ever produced. More than 200 objects will go on display, with the show-stopper being three eggs lent by Moscow Kremlin Museums . They include the largest Imperial egg, the Moscow Kremlin egg, which was inspired by the architecture of the Dormition cathedral in the Russian capital. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3syxozY

Singer said that she was ‘embarrassed by the light’ in which Framing Britney Spears cast her Britney Spears said she “cried for two weeks” after watching part of a high-profile documentary that explored her career. Framing Britney Spears premiered in February and examined the pop superstar’s rise to the summit of the music industry, her treatment at the hands of the tabloid media, her involuntary commitment to a psychiatric ward in 2008, and the subsequent conservatorship (an “imposed power-of-attorney-on-steroids” ) given to her father that has had him oversee her finances and personal affairs since 2008. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2PGaubm

Actors unable to travel to Los Angeles had earlier been told a virtual appearance at the awards would not be allowed The Academy will reportedly allow British nominees to take part in the Oscars from London, after earlier warning that appearing via Zoom was not an option . The 93rd Academy Awards will take place on 25 April in the US with an in-person event at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles. Some live elements of the show will be included from the ceremony’s usual home of the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood. After nominees were earlier told a virtual appearance was not allowed, producers for the ceremony have said they will set up “hubs” in London and Paris to make it easier for Europe-based stars, according to the Hollywood Reporter . The Academy, the body that oversees the Oscars, is still encouraging anyone who can safely and legally travel to Los Angeles for the ceremony to do so, the Reporter said. Coronavirus is surging across much of Europe and nominees busy with prod

Jennifer Shah and Stuart Smith accused of cheating hundreds of people over 10 years with telemarketing scheme Two members of the reality TV show The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City were arrested Tuesday on federal fraud charges, which alleged that they used a business to cheat hundreds of people nationwide over a 10-year period in a telemarketing scheme. Jennifer Shah, 47, of Park City, Utah, and Stuart Smith, 43, of Lehi, Utah, were arrested in Utah on charges including conspiracy unsealed in New York City, authorities announced. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sEurOj

Liam Williams’s mockumentary about social media wannabes returns. Plus: things go from bad to worse in The Terror. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/39wNQJs

The charming and poignant animated short film, from Iceland, is nominated for an Oscar. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3fvOGKn

Kids at rubbish tips, adolescents on the dole, sex workers in the street … the photographer made marginalised lives matter. But recognition came too late. Now her daughter’s making a film about her extraordinary life One of Tish Murtha’s first photography assignments, after she enrolled at Newport College of Art in 1976, was to shoot people at work. Befriending a man called Wilf who, like her father, was a scrap man, she went on to take magical photographs at the rubbish dump, where he was often to be found. Some of her images show a fantastical figure in a mouse mask. Another captures a girl with her head in a skip, scavenging for lost treasure. “It was very much what she knew,” says Ella Murtha, Tish’s daughter. “My granda and uncles would go down to the dump and find gems. That’s how they were brought up – to be creative and never waste anything. She took that mentality into her photography. There were treasures to be found everywhere, and what other people might not have found im

Cooking ideas for the next pandemic. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/39tbHd1

Royal Opera House’s music director will make move – a ‘dream come true’ – in September 2024 Sir Antonio Pappano is to step down as music director of the Royal Opera House to succeed Sir Simon Rattle as chief conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO). Pappano has been at Covent Garden since 2002, the opera house’s longest-serving music director. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2QHGkVA

The recent BFI Flare festival of LGBTIQ+ films showcased a raft of transgender titles from a powerful family drama to a devastating documentary about a jazz musician. They bear witness to a complicated but optimistic new future The scenery and production design of Cowboys make you sit up and take notice from the off. They feel like signals that this is not just another trans tearjerker but a film with much bolder ambition and complexity. The plot revolves around dad Troy and 11-year-old Joe, who run away from their problems together into the Montana wilderness, with but the flimsiest of plans. We are given context via flashbacks: Troy’s struggle to “be a good man” and Joe’s to “be a girl”. The interweaving works well yet results in a lack of time spent up in the mountains, getting to know present-day father and son. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3dlszn5

Concerns over inclusivity for non-US-based nominees and those who are vulnerable or shielding to be raised with show producers in Tuesday summit Producers for this year’s Oscars ceremony are said to be considering relaxing their policy of mandatory in-person attendance for this year’s nominees. According to a story in the Hollywood Reporter , the Academy has invited all nominees to participate in a Tuesday morning Zoom “conversation with show producers” Steven Soderbergh, Stacey Sher and Jesse Collins. This will include “updates about the show” as well as details on options should they need to participate remotely. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2PJyHNP

New memoir claims the actor has faced ill-treatment at the hands of doctors, the film industry and her own grandfather Sharon Stone had her breasts augmented without her consent during reconstructive surgery, the actor has claimed. Stone says she woke from a 2001 operation to reconstruct her breasts following the removal of benign tumours to find they had increased in size, because the doctor felt she “would look better with bigger, ‘better’ boobs”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31w29K1

Alice is brought low by post-natal depression and alcoholism – while Ambridge’s neighbours put on a rival play production A thought experiment: you are giving birth, six weeks early, on the back seat of a clapped-out Nissan Note outside a branch of Toys R Us on the Borchester bypass. (The BBC draws a veil over certain brand details, but you know I’m right.) By which of the inhabitants of Ambridge would you least like to be assisted? Leaving aside Bert and Clive Horrobin, obvs, the correct answer is clearly feckless Jazzer McCreary and Jim “the prof” Lloyd. And yet ... when Alice pushed out young Martha, to be caught in the surprised and actually rather tender arms of Jazzer himself, it was not just the wee wain who was greeting but – iron-hearted journalist that I am - I may myself just possibly have shed a tear. But poor Alice. The Furies have long been circling around her. Too posh, too entitled and too happily married to Ambridge’s sexiest man (a farrier, I rest my case) she was b

Following the Atlanta shootings, the K-pop group shared their experiences of discrimination and called for respect and solidarity The K-pop group BTS has condemned anti-Asian racism in the wake of growing incidents of violence and discrimination against Asian people. The vastly influential seven-piece paid tribute to the eight victims of the recent shootings at three Atlanta massage parlours , who included six Asian women. “We feel grief and anger,” they wrote in a statement published on social media . Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/39qnGbr

An efficient memory system, Lisa Genova writes, involves “a finely orchestrated balancing act between data storage and data disposal.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2PaCNyX

The author reads his story from the April 5, 2021, issue of the magazine. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3fDN7KH

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. But, mostly, it was the worst of times. In fact, not once had it felt like the best of times.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/39syrd9

This Oscar-nominated animated short, “Yes-People,” follows several Icelanders as they navigate minor daily conflicts—on their way to work, or to school, or while grocery shopping. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3dhbESJ

The standup on representation, Matt Hancock, her new travel show and why she loves Norwich A Great British, Female, Gay, Disabled, Covid-Compliant Adventure was the original name for Rosie Jones’s new travel show. “But,” says its host, “we thought that when you’ve got a presenter who speaks slowly, introducing that would take all bloody day.” She also might have called it Stereotypically Shit Places, another phrase bandied about in today’s Zoom chat. “The idea,” she says, “was to visit places where the local people would go: ‘Why have you come to Whitby for your holiday?!’” In the end, Channel 4 settled on Trip Hazard: My Great British Adventure. The four-part series, about comedian-of-the-moment Jones “going to shit places and making the most of it”, premieres this spring. Related: The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainment tips Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3u7eyAw

Institutions across globe could take years to recover from disastrous 2020, suggests survey Coronavirus – latest updates See all our coronavirus coverage Visitor numbers at the world’s top 100 museums and art galleries plunged by 77% last year, down from 230 million in 2019 to just 54 million as the pandemic forced closure on an unprecedented scale. The survey carried out annually by the Art Newspaper for more than 20 years is normally an upbeat one, highlighting which museums had good years and what the most popular exhibitions were, whether in London, New York or São Paulo. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31u1ucb

Tom Dare’s hilarious podcast celebrates what he calls a ‘really gay’ scene – and has tackled its homophobia Back in November, the Hell Bent for Metal podcast (HBFM) put out their first episode, called Gay Satanic Love Songs. If you’re worried that they played their trump card too early, this was followed by an edition entitled BDSM Gear and Black Metal, and another named Horny German Werewolves. It quickly became clear what you were getting: it’s gay, it’s about heavy metal, and it’s very, very funny. As a gay rock fan, HBFM founder and co-host Tom Dare’s hope was to be visible to other LGBTQ+ lovers of heavy music, and to offer a queer perspective that he felt was missing from a scene that is still affected by homophobia. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3dgHfnM

HBO documentary The Last Cruise revisits, through footage recorded by passengers and crew, the early-pandemic horror of the Diamond Princess cruise disaster Before the shutdowns and eerie images of a barren Times Square, before the bungled US federal response to a virus that has since killed 549,000 Americans and nearly 2.8m people worldwide, before most people even had a date they could loosely observe as a pandemic anniversary this past month, there was the Diamond Princess . The cruise ship departed from Yokohama, Japan on 20 January 2020 for a roundtrip tour of southeast Asia. On board was an 80-year-old passenger from Hong Kong who had recently visited Shenzen, Guangdong Province, China. At the time, there were only four confirmed cases of the then-unnamed Covid-19 virus outside mainland China; within two weeks, the ship would be stalled in the Japanese harbor under quarantine as the largest coronavirus outbreak outside Wuhan – 712 people, 14 of whom would die. Continue readin

With public art collections closed we bring the art to you, exploring hidden gems from across the country in partnership with Art UK. Today’s pick: the Ingram Collection’s Riace III by Elisabeth Frink In 1972, a swimmer found two lifesize Greek bronzes in the sea off the Italian coast near Riace. Dated to around 500BC, these beautifully modelled figures became known as the Riace Warriors and their public display in 1981 was a major cultural event . They also captured the imagination of British sculptor Dame Elisabeth Frink . Frink had always been drawn to the male figure, finding it a suitable vehicle to express one of her central preoccupations – what it means to be human. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3m3hVFG

Kenyan novelist’s The Perfect Nine is first work written in an indigenous African language to be longlisted Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o has become the first writer to be nominated for the International Booker prize as both author and translator of the same book, and the first nominee writing in an indigenous African language. The 83-year-old Kenyan and perennial Nobel favourite is among 13 authors nominated for the award for best translated fiction, a £50,000 prize split evenly between author and translator. Thiong’o is nominated as writer and translator of The Perfect Nine, a novel-in-verse described by the judges as “a magisterial and poetic tale about women’s place in a society of gods”, and written in the Bantu language Gikuyu. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/39sk8oX

The drama series about lottery winners is back. And this time, thanks to a very talented dog called Happy, it’s exploited kennel-workers who have hit the jackpot. The veteran TV writer reveals all There’s a dog in the new series of The Syndicate that’s small, white and fluffy. Caninewise, that’s not my cup of tea at all. Yet I was struck by its tremendous acting. This dog is a genuine talent, packing a huge range of emotions into its tiny face, while displaying considerable comic timing. As I watched the drama, written by Kay Mellor, I wondered how you would train an animal to be so skilful. Well, it turns out it’s Mellor’s own dog, Happy. Any normal person, getting such a pet for the first time at the age of 70, would just post a lot of pictures of it on Facebook. Instead, Mellor entirely rethought season four of the BBC show. As its name suggests, The Syndicate is about people who win the lottery, with a different group followed in each series. The first was set in a Leeds supermar

Neil Morrissey and Gaynor Faye lead the cast as a group of kennel workers who think they’ve won big. Plus: the best of Yorkshire cuisine. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31vAKI5

The Kendal family of actors star in a story inspired by their travels around India, whose booming film industry upstages their theatrical troupe The stage on screen: more films about theatre The actor Geoffrey Bragg was born in 1909 in the Lake District and later adopted the name of his birth town of Kendal but, at schools and theatres across India in the 1940s and 50s, he was recognised simply as the “Shakespeare Wallah”. The adventurous troupe of performers he led in productions of classic plays included his wife, Laura Liddell, daughter Jennifer and youngest daughter Felicity Kendal , who worked first as a stage hand then made her acting debut aged nine as Macduff’s son in Macbeth. Geoffrey Kendal and his family star together in the film Shakespeare Wallah (1965), produced by Ismail Merchant and directed by James Ivory as the second feature for their fledgling Merchant Ivory stable. In the film, the Kendals’ theatre ensemble, which was named Shakespeareana, morphs into a troupe

The actor rebrands himself as an action hero in this clever yet blinkered drama of a retired government hit man. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3u2Piv2

“We Real Cool” poet: fifteen letters. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/31pDHtQ

The psychologist taught us that what we remember is not fixed, but her work testifying for defendants like Harvey Weinstein collides with our traumatized moment. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/31rg44b

New cartoons from the magazine. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3fn1eUl

“Zabor, or the Psalms,” “Milk Blood Heat,” “Why the Innocent Plead Guilty and the Guilty Go Free,” and “The Disordered Cosmos.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3lZbROB

According to “Waffles + Mochi,” Obama’s food-travelogue series for kids, being good means absorbing good, organic things, like fresh mushrooms and politically astute children’s programming. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3lZaCPg

The recording artist and producer who has worked with Rhianna and Kanye West co-wrote “Lonely,” the keening Justin Bieber ballad, but prefers to be an unserious oasis in a serious world. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/39mgYmA

The Battersea Poltergeist is just one of many surging up the charts. Its creator, and others, explain why the pandemic has led people to seek out scary stories By his own admission, Danny Robins has always been “obsessed with ghosts”. “I think it might have been growing up with atheist parents,” says the writer and broadcaster, who co-created Radio 4’s lauded Sir Lenny Henry vehicle Rudy’s Rare Records , among many other works. Among them is the 2017 investigative podcast about the paranormal, Haunted . “As a kid, I was very aware of the absence of belief,” he continues. “I think I might have just wanted to be part of a club. To be part of a club of believers.” Now in his early 40s, Robins is trying to recruit as many believers as possible to the club via his new docudrama podcast, The Battersea Poltergeist . Available on BBC Sounds, it tells the story, beginning in 1956, of a bizarre 12-year-long haunting that resulted in Shirley Hitchings (just 15 at the start of it all) and the vi

A grand jury indicted Johnson on charges of ‘wilful torture, wilful abuse, and cruelly beating or otherwise wilfully maltreating a child under the age of 18’ Steven William Johnson, the drummer with Grammy-winning rock band Alabama Shakes , has been arrested on charges of child abuse. The charges include “wilful torture, wilful abuse, and cruelly beating or otherwise wilfully maltreating a child under the age of 18”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31uR77Y

The Paramore rebel was my idol at 13. Having made great music in the face of sexism and trauma, she is my idol now too Hayley Nicole Williams and I share a love of flowers, two of our given names, and a wealth of musical DNA. As the teenaged frontperson of Paramore , Williams soundtracked my desperate desire to fit in. As an adult, her solo work reminds me that it’s far more fun to be your principled self. I first encountered Paramore during the boom of third-wave, MTV-era emo. I was around 13 and fanatical about music but in need of a vessel heavier than my beloved McFly through which to channel my new teenage angst. I suspect that Paramore’s single Emergency was what did it for me first – the video showed a red-haired 16-year-old Hayley in a ragged ballgown, dead roses in her lap, crying out for recognition: “So are you listening? / So are you watching me?” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3sJOxHf

The mentor to some of Britain’s top performers believes the best acting comes from a childhood sense of playfulness – and is fraught with danger There’s a famous yarn about Laurence Olivier leaving the stage in anguish after a barnstorming performance. Don’t you know you were brilliant, asked a colleague. Of course, said Olivier – “but I don’t know why”. Defining the core of outstanding performance and learning how to pass it on – it’s a slippery quest to which New Zealand-born acting teacher Kenneth Rea has devoted more than 40 years. “In the 1980s some people began to become exceptionally successful,” says Rea, speaking from the studio in his London garden, “and what fascinated me was, what were those people doing that the rest were not? What is this secret quality, and can I find the crucial exercises that will produce that?” He learned from revelatory teachers in Japan and China, and gradually distilled it down to seven key qualities. “There’s no easy recipe for how to become an

There’s furore over the skunk’s reported removal from the forthcoming Space Jam sequel. But animation’s history is filled with stereotypes that have rightfully been erased They are cancelling everything! At least, if you’re a particular brand of conservative commentator they are. First they came for the Muppets and Dr Seuss , now they’re cancelling Pepé Le Pew! Yes, everyone’s favourite caricature-French cartoon skunk has reportedly been excised from the forthcoming Space Jam sequel. What’s the world coming to? Where will it end? Related: The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainment tips Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31sqsZj

To remake society after the pandemic, we must swap Insta self‑improvement for something more radical, argues author Sam Byers Across much of the west, March is a milestone both surreal and distressing: a full year of life in Covid-19’s shadow. Twelve months ago, we couldn’t imagine what we were about to experience; now we can’t process what we’ve endured. This was a year of seemingly irresolvable contradictions. Our grief was collective, yet rituals of communal mourning were denied us. We hymned the “global effort” to produce a vaccine, then recoiled into vaccine nationalism the moment that effort bore fruit. Even as Zoom held us together, Covid denial and conspiracy theories in the family WhatsApp tore us apart. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3dctwyd

With Wet Wet Wet, Pellow was one of the biggest-selling musicians of the 90s. But heroin and alcohol soon became a problem. He talks about heroes, love and conquering his demons Marti Pellow remembers his introduction to booze clearly. He was a young boy, about 11, and he sneaked a can of beer from his father. “I knew as soon as I had my first drink that it made me feel different,” he says. “I had a fuzzy feeling in my stomach. I liked the rush of that. It made me feel light.” By the time he was 12, he would go to dances with his friends and alcohol would give him dutch courage. “I’d ask an adult to buy me a couple of cans of lager. It gave me a wee bit more confidence to ask a girl to dance; it made me feel larger than life.” Pellow went on to become the frontman of Wet Wet Wet, the blue-eyed soul band whose version of Love Is All Around, as featured in Four Weddings and a Funeral, topped the charts for 15 weeks and is still the UK’s biggest-selling love song. By the time he left We

There’s a calmer pace to the series than we’ve come to expect, but that doesn’t mean the antics of Ted, Steve, Kate and co are any less enjoyable Spoiler alert: this blog is for those watching series six of Line of Duty (it also contains spoilers from earlier series). Don’t read on unless you have watched the second episode of the new series. Hello and welcome to the episode two recap. First, I want to apologise for the errors last week – particularly beardgate. I’m writing this from hospital, so apologies in advance for possible mistakes. Anyway, let’s get to it. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3wa1JqC

Continuing our series of writers defending loathed films is a reappraisal of Amanda Bynes’s gender-swapping 2006 comedy I’m sure you must be wondering why a movie in which there is a scene where Amanda Bynes, playing a girl pretending to be her brother, screws up her face to stridently declare in a cartoonishly male voice, “I am a dude. I am a hunky dude! I’m a badass hunky dude!” was not lauded for being an example of comic excellence. OK, maybe you’re not wondering that but I certainly am. This is one of the most spectacular moments of hilarity in She’s the Man, the 2006 adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, a stone-cold teen comedy classic that deserves far more recognition than the mediocre reviews gave it. Related: Hear me out: why Speed 2: Cruise Control isn't a bad movie Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3m1mHDz

With public art collections closed we are bringing the art to you, exploring highlights from across the country in partnership with Art UK. Today’s pick: Dudmaston’s Still Life With Fruit, Bird’s Nest and Insects by Rachel Ruysch A luscious arrangement of late-season fruit is amassed at the base of a young oak tree. Clusters of grapes nestle between plump peaches, unhusked corn and a single, rotund gourd. Encroaching on this display is a rich woodland understorey: fungi, thistle, white dead-nettle, forget-me-not and thorny sprays of bramble. Brilliant flashes of red and orange in the form of physalis seed heads, rowan berries and corn kernels enliven this shaded spot. A chipped stone plinth is a singular vestige of what may have once been a formal garden. The scene teems with snails and insects – creatures whose short lifespans embody transience and impermanence, the hallmarks of a vanitas . So too do the ripening fruits, some on the cusp of over-maturing and rotting. White mould bloo

Leaders rally in support of ‘father of Italian language’ after withering comments in German newspaper Italian political and cultural leaders have sprung to the defence of their much-revered poet Dante Alighieri after a German newspaper downplayed his importance to the Italian language and said he was “light years” away from William Shakespeare. In a comment piece in Frankfurter Rundschau, Arno Widmann wrote that even though Dante “brought the national language to great heights”, Italian schoolchildren struggled to understand the antiquated verse of his Divine Comedy , which was written in 1320. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3wa3152

John Blackman, best known as the voice of Dickie Knee, says singer should have complained at the time, but singer says ‘it’s all about timing’ Hey Hey It’s Saturday voiceover artist John Blackman has suggested Kamahl should have moved on from the “humiliation” he felt from being the target of racist remarks on the long-running Nine variety show. After Kamahl’s face was covered with white powder in one 1984 skit, Blackman’s voice was heard off camera saying: “You’re a real white man now Kamahl, you know that?” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31pf14y

First the Rose family’s former mansion hit the real estate lists – now it’s the 10-room motel they called home The motel home of the Rose family in the Emmy-sweeping Canadian TV series Schitt’s Creek is up for sale for C$2m. The Hockley Motel in the Canadian town of Mono, Ontario, was a key filming location throughout the six seasons of the hit CBC sitcom. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3tUp3XI

Race on to preserve centrepiece at Cragside, the first house in the world to be lit by hydroelectric power A race has begun to prevent one of the most spectacular fireplaces in the UK from crumbling because of the increase in heavy rainfall brought about by climate change. The drawing room fireplace at Cragside, Northumberland, is deliberately over the top, the National Trust’s property curator, Clara Woolford, said. “It is ridiculously extravagant and is in stark contrast to the rest of the house, which was intentional.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3lY1tXk

Friends and family pay tribute to the late England and Ireland football star. Plus: Storyville exposes corruption in Romania. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3m0106K

It’s hosted opera greats, suffragette rallies, Hitchcock films, sports events, sci-fi conventions – and, of course, the Proms and countless rock gigs. Artists from Led Zeppelin to Abba recall their moments on the hallowed stage The Royal Albert Hall is 150 years old today (and the Guardian was there to see it opened by Queen Victoria ). With a design based on a Roman amphitheatre, stacked balconies pack the audience close to the action – and at a capacity touching 6,000, the number of visitors entertained at the London venue runs to many millions. But what is it like to play as a performer? We asked artists and sportspeople for their memories of being centre stage at the iconic venue. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3lYPLf3

Submit your caption. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3lXUi1l

With a slew of books to mark the songwriter’s birthday due, we look at the industry that has grown up around the man who forced academia to take pop seriously Scroll down for Q&As with the authors of four new Dylan books “It’s gonna take a hundred years before they understand me!” Bob Dylan once claimed, “they” being the cohorts of fans, critics and Dylanologists who have dogged his tracks ever since Robert Zimmerman, chippy teen of Hibbing, Minnesota, became Bob Dylan, world-famous singer, songwriter, and pop’s most enduring enigma. “That’s exactly the quote James Joyce made about Ulysses,” points out Sean Latham, professor of English at the University of Tulsa and head of the institute for Bob Dylan Studies recently established there. “Joyce said, ‘I put so many puzzles and enigmas in Ulysses it will take the scholars 100 years to solve them’.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3u1yUuR

The comedian and TV presenter on finding the confidence to write a novel after ‘bluffing it’ in TV for 30 years – and why, come spring, she still feels that Bake Off pang Mel Giedroyc’s first novel, The Best Things , is published on April Fools’ Day. It was her family that pointed this out. “I’m such a dolt, I hadn’t cottoned on,” she laughs – although, comedian that she is, she thinks the date well chosen. April has always been important to her: it is the month when filming used to start for the BBC’s The Great British Bake Off , which she co-presented with her chum Sue Perkins (“Perks”), along with their other greatest hits such as Mel & Sue and Light Lunch . While she has no regrets about the decision to leave Bake Off , she will admit to “a pang” every spring: “As soon as the daffodils are out, especially on cold mornings when you’re hit by a nice patch of sun, I think of Mary, the tent, the excitement of meeting a new batch of bakers…” Since Bake Off , Giedroyc has multita

The BBC is right to diversify outside the capital – but its radical relocation plan is being badly managed Just over a week ago, the BBC made an announcement, to its staff and to the press. It was a big’un. Over the next few years, trumpeted the Beeb, it will move various parts of its huge operation to different locations across the UK, so that by 2027, more than 50% of BBC spending will be outside London. That is, of course, completely right. Even the most kombucha-sozzled media elitist will agree that our national broadcaster should represent everyone who pays its licence fee. The BBC, which employs thousands of people, needs to spread not only its spending across the country, but also its focus and culture. The move out of London is the right one. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3lWW6Yi

Performance recalls pre-pandemic times at Palau Sant Jordi concert hall in Barcelona on Saturday night Coronavirus – latest updates See all our coronavirus coverage If one overlooked the white face masks dotting the tightly packed crowd of music lovers, it was almost like pre-pandemic times in Barcelona’s Palau Sant Jordi concert hall Saturday night. Five thousand rock fans enjoyed a real-as-can-be concert after passing a same-day coronavirus screening to test its effectiveness in preventing outbreaks of the virus at large cultural events. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2NYuMwc

Donors contribute to buy painting of Tamara Karsavina, co-founder of the London ballet school A rare and valuable portrait of the Russian ballerina Tamara Karsavina, Anna Pavlova’s great rival and one of the key dancers behind a revolution in ballet, has been bought for the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD). Karsavina presided over the London teaching school, which she co-founded, for many years, instilling a modern emphasis on expressive movement over stiff tradition. “This is such a ravishing and iconic picture, I thought the RAD should have it when I heard it was up for auction at Christie’s at the end of last year,” said Lady Sainsbury of Preston Candover, the former dancer Anya Linden. “The great English choreographer Frederick Ashton once wrote that working with Karsavina was like being visited by ‘a queen from a bigger and more glamorous world’, and he said that her generosity, humanity and discipline had inspired the whole company of Royal Ballet dancers.” Continue reading... f

Lazy writing mars this update of the cat and mouse feud The long-running feud between cat and smart-aleck mouse gets a new platform in this feature-length adaptation of the Hanna Barbera cartoon. The backdrop is a swanky Manhattan hotel, which is set to host the wedding of the year. The approach, a marriage of cluttered live action with madcap 2D animation, owes an obvious debt to Who Framed Roger Rabbit , but has more in common with the wearisome and unfunny Garfield: The Movie . Chloë Grace Moretz stars as Kayla, an opportunist who cons her way into a job using a stolen résumé. It’s astute casting – Moretz’s habitually overblown acting style seems slightly less jarring when juxtaposed with rampaging cartoon elephants. The film is most entertaining when it wreaks havoc – a car chase involving a commandeered military drone is a slickly executed riot. But lazy writing squashes any real fun as emphatically as an Acme anvil dropped from a roof. • Available on all platforms Continue re

From the magazine’s archive: pieces about the influence of film on literature, and vice versa. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3sr4otU

In her new memoir, the actor opens up about being a loner, surviving pre-#MeToo Hollywood, and getting struck by lightning. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cvCRlw

Politics and art in a Catskill front yard. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3dg1Rw7

The hardest thing about being an artist is that there isn’t really a set way of doing it. So there are a lot of unknowns, not only at the beginning but all along the way. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2QP7Ocd

A free, online cryptic crossword puzzle from the New Yorker’s archive, with answers and clues that exhibit the wit and intelligence of the magazine. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2PBZTyh

The issues involved are nearly impossible to settle as long as policymakers regard decency as a political weakness rather than as a moral strength. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3fp6czU

The Stranger Things star is still in her teens, but has moved beyond new kid on the block to be a Hollywood power broker It was clearly a moment designed to perplex. Fans of the hit Netflix show Stranger Things were left speculating at the end of season three as to how and why Eleven, played by Millie Bobby Brown, had suddenly lost her supernatural power to move things around with her mind. Theories have ricocheted across social media during the long wait for the return of the show. But Brown, an English actress who is only 17, has already made such an impact with her Stranger Things role that this spring the question seems something of a side issue, even among her many devotees. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3cu0ACz

Pitlochry Festival theatre; Crucible Sheffield; podcast; all available online Mark Ravenhill tenderly explores his mother’s life; monologues and music from Sheffield; and actors talk about their favourite speeches It is a long way from Shopping and F***ing . In 1996 Mark Ravenhill was celebrated and reviled for his rapid, urban scenes, one of which featured oral sex in Harvey Nicks. Now he has written a domestic, autobiographical audio drama that proclaims the importance of Beatrix Potter’s animal tales. Angela is the first of eight new plays produced by Sound Stage, the audio-digital theatre platform set up by Pitlochry Festival Theatre and Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum in collaboration with Naked Productions. It is a promising start. A strong cast includes Toby Jones, Pam Ferris and Joseph Millson. Polly Thomas’s direction is decisive: not bombarded with sound effects but inflected by Alexandra Faye Braithwaite’s music, which falls like a sigh between scenes. Wistfulness and disturbanc

Creative giants from Hirst to Hambling have produced masterpieces a few centimetres across for a scaled-down show Life has been reduced in scale for most people over the past 12 months, but now an extraordinary line-up of British artists, including Damien Hirst, Tacita Dean, Edmund de Waal, Grayson Perry, John Akomfrah and Rachel Whiteread, have taken it a step further by miniaturising their art. Taking up an invitation from Pallant House Gallery in West Sussex, more than 30 leading British artists have made tiny works for a doll’s house-size exhibition, Masterpieces in Miniature, that will provide a microcosm of contemporary visual arts. Mini sculptures, oil paintings, ceramics and photographs from veteran artists such as Michael Craig-Martin and Maggi Hambling to the 2017 Turner prize winner Lubaina Himid – the first black woman to win the prize – are to go on display in a specially designed model gallery from 26 June, alongside key names established in the Young British Artist er

Kate Winslet and Saoirse Ronan’s 19th-century romance showcases their talents but doesn’t warm the heart This handsome second feature from the writer-director of 2017’s brilliant God’s Own Country is another hesitant love story set against the backdrop of a bracing British locale: the sea-battered Dorset coast around the famous Cobb of Lyme Regis harbour. It has been the setting for some overcooked screen moments in the past, although the emotional weather forecast here is frosty with occasional storms. Kate Winslet is superbly flinty as Mary Anning, the 19th-century palaeontologist whose under-attributed finds have graced the display cases of the British Museum since her childhood. An early image sees a handwritten label for the historic “Sea Lizard, found by Miss Mary Anning” being tuttingly replaced by a floridly embellished sign reading “Ichthyosaurus, Lyme Regis, Presented by H Hoste Henley Esq”. It’s a concise way of illustrating both Anning’s outsider status (her role in the

Adding AI and more to its traditional art offerings, the festival’s theme of artistic experience shared through technology could not be more timely There’s a sugary quality to Chiptune — the synthesized electronic music popularised by video game consoles and arcade machines in the 1980s. Hearing it live at the online “listening party” for Larry Achiampong’s series, Videogame Mixtape , is perhaps comparable to eating, as an adult, the confectionery you once binged on as a kid – time is reversed, instantly evoking full-coloured memories of your youth. Achiampong’s listening party was one of a raft of online events to launch the postponed 11th edition of Liverpool’s biennial art festival: The Stomach and the Port . The British-Ghanaian artist has long been interested in video game storytelling, and his Videogame Mixtape is a meditation on the heritage and evolution of gaming music. The sonic limitations of Chiptune – its 8-bit or 16-bit processors could produce only a small number of s

The artist on fostering hope, why he doesn’t want a retrospective, and making work inspired by Picasso’s African art collection The British-Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare makes work – often in sculpture, painting and tapestry – that looks unflinchingly at race, class and colonialism. The 58-year-old, who is partly paralysed after contracting a virus of the spine in his late teens, was one of the original YBAs and was shortlisted for the Turner prize in 2004. His 2010 sculpture Nelson’s Ship in a Bottle , a scaled-down replica of HMS Victory with sails made from his signature batik fabric, was one of the most memorable artworks on Trafalgar Square’s fourth plinth and now has a permanent home outside the Maritime Museum in Greenwich. Shonibare was recently given the 2021 Art Icon award by the Whitechapel Gallery. Congratulations on becoming the Whitechapel’s eighth Art Icon. You join a storied list of artists, including Howard Hodgkin and Rachel Whiteread … I’ve been a fan of that

(Luaka Bop) Five years in the making, this breathtaking album transcends the genres each of its three collaborators bring to the table Not strictly classical, jazz or ambient electronica, this one-track, nine-movement album embodies the highest, most etiolated aspects of all three disciplines. British artist Sam “Floating Points” Shepherd is the anchor here, an electronic free thinker with a neuroscience doctorate. He supplies recurring leitmotifs and Promises ’s sense of gossamer, largely peaceable inquiry. Jazz legend Pharoah Sanders should need no introduction ; in his first recordings for more than 10 years, the saxophonist mostly holds off the free skronk of some of his most famous recordings in favour of his other mode: deeply felt spiritual jazz interventions. (Sanders’s wordless vocals also add to the promise of Promises .) Halfway through, the forward-thinking London Symphony Orchestra strings turn up and the dappled otherworldliness enters a more cinematic and canonical

From the troubled marriages to the breakthroughs that led to Sabbath’s Theater and American Pastoral… a beautifully written book by Roth’s chosen biographer In response to that staple biographer’s question, “when were you happiest?”, Philip Roth tended to think of his first year as a graduate student at the University of Chicago, when he was free to pursue his persistent “Byronic dream” of “bibliography by day, women by night”. In the six decades that followed, as Blake Bailey’s compulsively readable life of the novelist reveals, this idealised schedule was generally compromised one way or another, to Roth’s frequent frustration and sometime derangement. In Chicago and subsequently during his two-year national service beginning at Fort Dix, he had regular visits from his first obsessive lover, Maxine Groffsky, and he reminisced fondly to Bailey how on meeting, they would always tear each other’s clothes off at the door. “I haven’t done that in a while,” Roth mused, aged 79. “I take th

Billed as her farewell to her fans, a new documentary recounts the tumultuous life and musical success of the R&B star. Plus: Alan Yentob talks to Kazuo Ishiguro. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3tVcU4A

Actor who plays Ken Barlow in Coronation Street says he is looking forward to returning as soon as possible Coronavirus – latest updates See all our coronavirus coverage Bill Roache has “recovered well” after testing positive for Covid-19, Coronation Street has said. The 88-year-old star who plays Ken Barlow, has taken time off from the ITV soap. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2PfQ354

The Booker-nominated writer on how growing up between England and Zimbabwe inspired her first novel - and why she started over after reading Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch Nervous Conditions is a novel about yearning and wanting, about black girls – in this case Zimbabwean girls – desiring better for themselves and their loved ones. I wrote it as a fugitive. A fugitive from my first memories and of what my life had become. Related: Tsitsi Dangarembga: 'I am afraid. There have been abductions' Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3ryX3ra

Galasy ZMesta song sparks backlash from opposition figures, who have faced a violent crackdown during demonstrations Organisers of this year’s Eurovision song contest have disqualified Belarus, ruling that its entry song – by a band whose lyrics have been deemed in the past to mock anti-government protests – is in breach of competition guidelines. Earlier this month the organisers rejected an entry by Belarus, which has been gripped by political crisis since August last year, as the submitted song mocked protests against President Alexander Lukashenko. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3w6VTX2

I devoured 20 of the films in a month-long frenzy. But I can’t quite shake off the guilt that comes with this guilty pleasure I started England’s second lockdown last year with good intentions: I was broke and underemployed, and since it didn’t look like my economic circumstances would be improving anytime soon, I was determined to emerge from the pandemic rich in cultural capital. I decided to work my way through the British Film Institute’s directors’ poll of the 100 best films ever made and soon I was watching arthouse films like there was going to be an exam at the end of the pandemic. This wasn’t purely about self-improvement: many of these films I found straightforwardly entertaining or moving, while some were more challenging (ie boring) but rewarding in different ways. It felt like a good use of time. But then, one Friday evening, it all came crashing down: my younger brother suggested that we watch Captain America: The Winter Soldier , on the tantalising promise that it was

The great French soprano takes her leave of the stage with a glittering three-disc retrospective. Elsewhere, moths, musk and birdsong • The French singer and actor Natalie Dessay has stepped away from the operatic stage, alas, but stands out as one of the greatest coloratura sopranos of recent times, especially in the 1990s and 2000s. À l’opéra (Erato) is a three-CD set from across her career, with different companies from the Royal Opera House to Les Arts Florissants to Le Concert d’Astrée. One disc is of French repertoire (Gounod, Meyerbeer, Offenbach), one Italian (Bellini, Verdi, Donizetti) and the last is the rest: including Mozart, Richard Strauss and Stravinsky. Distinguished by a bright, gleaming tone, fiery energy, nimble ornamentation and crisp, verbal dexterity, Dessay excels especially in the three Cleopatra arias from Handel’s Giulio Cesare . Her Chanson d’Olympia from Les contes d’Hoffmann , recorded in 1996, remains a showstopper, as does Caro nome from Rigoletto . T

Glastonbury’s off, but there are a whole host of festivals on the horizon – featuring nu-jazz, the queen of drill, Liam Gallagher and a Cheese Hub Modern Toss on festivals Bigfoot’s USP is IPA. A craft beer paradise, there’ll be just as many kinds of ale as there will be bands, with Primal Scream, Hot Chip, Fat White Family, Baxter Dury, Big Joanie and many more getting all hopped up in the grounds of a lavish stately home. Go for: The beer tent to end all beer tents, hosted by beloved Hackney boozer The Gun. Stay for: Club Mexicana’s vegan tacos. 18-20 June, Ragley Hall, Warwickshire Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3lUqti2

Deborah Meaden has heard every possible sob story. Peter Jones has laughed at every joke. Will a monthly subscription teabag service get a rise out of them? New series of Dragons’ Den (Thursday, 8pm, BBC One), then. No point me saying anything like: “They have changed Dragons’ Den – it is different now.” There is no point in me lying to you. The point of Dragons’ Den is that it is always Dragons’ Den. We are 16 years, 17 series and 18 separate Dragons deep into it now, and we have seen tectonic shifts in the global economy over that time – the collapse of the housing market! Austerity! The impending doom of the post-Covid financial reality! – and no matter what happens, somewhere in Salford Quays, Deborah Meaden is sitting next to a big stack of printed-out money, refusing to spend it. Related: The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainment tips Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3fkTq5l

In CNN’s culinary travel series, Italy is beautiful and the food of Italy is beautiful. Not insignificantly, Tucci is beautiful, too. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3w3ys0O

When more than two hundred buyers of luxe sofas from ABC Carpet got a group e-mail about a delivery delay, the result was anger, frustration, commiseration, bad jokes, and matchmaking. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3dfsv8q

The opposition is cast as one between cis-girl athletes on the one hand and a vast liberal conspiracy on the other. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3crFB3x

“And I am getting help. I have hired many, many lawyers to help me through this difficult time.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3w39cI1

She’s best known for her dark, difficult roles, and doesn’t suffer fools gladly. The actor talks about swinging in the 60s, family tragedy – and why she’s still got It ‘That photoshoot was such fun,” Charlotte Rampling says. “I was pinging.” “You were pinging ?” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3d9vMGy

The Women’s prize winner reflects on the life‑threatening virus that shaped her writing, the superstitions that held her back, and why her prize-winning novel Hamnet speaks to our times Maggie O’Farrell found the prospect of writing the central scenes of her prize-winning novel Hamnet , in which a mother sits helplessly by the bedside of her dying son, so traumatic that she couldn’t write them in the house. Instead, she had to escape to the shed, and “not a smart writing shed like Philip Pullman’s”, she says, “but a really disgusting, spidery, manky potting shed, which has since blown down in a gale”. And she could only do it in short bursts of 15 or 20 minutes before she would have to take a walk around the garden, and then go back in again. The novel, a fictionalised account of the death of Shakespeare’s only son from the bubonic plague (his twin sister Judith survived) and an at times almost unbearably tender portrayal of grief, was first published a year ago. An interlude halfwa

Guardian analysis of 31 events reveals many still falling short on equal gender representation As the UK festival industry gets back on its feet after a fallow, fun-free year, the issue of gender equality on lineups has fallen by the wayside, Guardian analysis of 31 events has shown. Friday marked a mini-boom for festival bill announcements, all heavily weighted towards male performers. Headlined by Liam Gallagher, Snow Patrol, David Guetta and Duran Duran, Isle of Wight offered a 73% male lineup. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2NUDWd6