Cultural News Today

Argentine cartoonist Joaquin Salvador Lavado, who created the beloved comic strip Mafalda, has died aged 88, his publisher announced Wednesday. from https://ift.tt/30itfEj

Lam Ka-tung vehicle Hand Rolled Cigarette and dance drama sequel The Way We Keep Dancing will fly the flag for Hong Kong cinema at the 57th Golden Horse Awards this year.The most prestigious awards for Chinese-language cinema, the Golden Horse Awards have often been called the “Oscars of Chinese-language cinema” because of their reputation for consistently recognising films for their artistic accomplishments, irrespective of their origin or commercial appeal.Once again, no films from mainland… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3l3ox56

From the All Creatures Great and Small reboot to Our Yorkshire Farm, the once-downmarket TV channel has won record ratings and awards – with comfort-viewing tales of the dales. But not everyone is happy In The Good Companions , the 1929 novel that gave him national fame, JB Priestley begins high up on the Pennines – the “knobbly backbone of England”. Looking down on the huddled communities that make their living in a Yorkshire landscape both beautiful and bleak, the author tells us: “At first the towns only seem a blacker edge to the high moorland, but now that you are closer you see the host of tall chimneys, the rows and rows of little houses, built of blackening stone, that are like tiny sharp ridges on the hills. These windy moors, these clanging dark valleys, these factories and little stone houses, have between them bred a race that has special characteristics.” From the literature of the Bront ë sisters and Priestley to films such as Lindsay Anderson’s This Sporting Life an...

As plays return to the stage here are some of the best – from Rent in Manchester to James Graham’s Bubble in Nottingham Roy Williams and Clint Dyer’s Death of England was a turbocharged monologue grappling with national identity. Now it has a sequel, performed by Giles Terera, who was sensational as Hamilton’s Aaron Burr. A newly reconfigured in-the-round Olivier theatre is the room where it happens. • National Theatre, 21 October-28 November Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3kUpVXQ

An ex-Playboy bunny is among those looking for love in the new series. Plus: the story of civil rights activist James Meredith. Here’s what to watch this evening Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HGknlf

List celebrates high-achieving black British individuals over past 400 years The model and transgender activist Munroe Bergdorf, the artist and film director Steve McQueen and the Booker prize-winning author Bernardine Evaristo are among the new names on a list celebrating key black individuals over the past 400 years. The mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees , businesswoman Sharon White and British Vogue’s first black editor, Edward Enninful , are among other new entries on the list of 100 great black Britons , whose stories are told in a book of the same name. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2G5R1ww

18th-century prison with gory history reopens as £8.5m visitor attraction in Cornwall Most visitors to Cornwall head to the surf beaches, the picturesque fishing harbours, art galleries, gardens or castles in search of light and joy. However, a murkier side of life in the south-west of Britain is being told from within the towering granite walls of an 18th-century prison, which is reopening as a new visitor attraction on Thursday. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3jo4Gxa

Is dislodging African artwork from a European museum a political statement, or a criminal act? That's the question a French court weighed Wednesday in an emotionally charged trial centered around a Congolese activist campaigning to take back art he says was plundered by colonizers. from https://ift.tt/3ieBZRP

John Cassidy writes about troubling takeaways from the first Presidential debate between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, including Trump’s refusal to denounce a white-supremacist group. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2HB1akX

The most poetic musician who ever lived? It’s hard to disagree with Liszt’s appraisal of Schubert, who, in his short life, used his astonishing gift for melodic and harmonic invention to create many enduring masterpieces He composed more than 600 songs – taking the art of writing German Lieder to a new plane – as well as seven completed symphonies, chamber music and piano sonatas. Yet there’s a sense that Franz Schubert (1797-1828) was still just beginning to exploit his immense gifts and to develop further the musical language he had inherited from Beethoven , which he combined with an astonishing gift for melodic and harmonic invention. Schubert was never a great performer, and he was always a freelance composer, relying on what he could earn from commissions and fees. Only a fraction of his music was published in his lifetime, and it was only after his death that the greatness of his achievement was recognised internationally. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian htt...

Described as ‘a message of love and solidarity’ and with signatories including Jeanette Winterson and Malorie Blackman, it comes days after a host of prominent literary names signed a letter defending JK Rowling Days after a host of prominent literary names signed a letter defending JK Rowling “against hate”, more than 200 writers, publishers and journalists including Jeanette Winterson , Malorie Blackman and Joanne Harris have put their names to another stating their support for transgender and non-binary people. The letter , which is described as “a message of love and solidarity for the trans and non-binary community”, was pulled together by acclaimed writers Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Daisy Johnson . With signatories also including Juno Dawson , Elizabeth Day , Max Porter , Nikesh Shukla , Sara Collins , Irenosen Okojie , Mary Jean Chan , Naoise Dolan , Olivia Sudjic , Sharlene Teo and Patrick Ness , it states that “non-binary lives are valid, trans women are women, trans m...

He became the icon of cool after only three films. Dean accomplished a lot before his death 65 years ago, at age 24. from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/3cN9tpA

If you want to take pictures with your smartphone and quickly share beautiful results, you need effective image editing tools. DW Digital tests the most popular apps. This week: "Perfect Image for iOS". from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/34dGmaS

Legend of Deification, the animated movie co-produced by the same company that made last year’s box office champion Nezha , is set to become the top grossing film on China’s national day holiday on Thursday. According to China’s largest ticketing app, Maoyan, Legend of Deification has so far chalked up 80 million yuan (US$11.7 million) in advance ticket sales for its opening day, which is also the start of the country’s “golden week” national holiday.Ranked second in Thursday’s advance ticket… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/36ltouy

Taryn Englehart and Jasmine Pierce humorously imagine feedback from the judges of “Top Chef.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Gmbgpg

From acrobatics to contortionists, delve into Guardian photographer Tristram Kenton’s archive of circus shots showing performers at their gravity-defying best All photographs by Tristram Kenton Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/33eTA7U

A free online puzzle published Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, 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/30k6kbK

In “Flower Punk,” Azuma Makoto uses plants to create stunning sculptures that connect humanity and nature. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cJT9Wp

The former Hüsker Dü and Sugar frontman is back with a career box set and an incendiary new album, having come to terms with childhood trauma, his sexuality and the death of his bandmate It’s been a fortnight since Bob Mould could open his windows. “The air is pretty toxic,” he reports from his home in San Francisco, as the California wildfires gradually turn the skies orange. It’s just one example of the unfortunate prescience of his new album, Blue Hearts, which opens with the words “the left coast is covered in ash and flames”. The veteran singer/songwriter’s response to the Trump presidency, Blue Hearts essays a broken America, from climate change, to rumblings of civil war (Heart on My Sleeve), to the hypocrisy of the religious right (Forecast of Rain, which anticipates Jerry Falwell Jr’s recent scandal ). “The terrible division in this country right now comes from the top, from our leader,” he says, scornfully. “This is trickle-down racism.” Continue reading... from Culture ...

Mohammad Reza Aslani’s gothic family thriller was banned in Iran and presumed lost, only to be found years later by his children in a junk shop. Now, painstakingly restored, it’s showing at the BFI London film festival The rediscovery of a film is seldom as fascinating a story as the film itself, but that’s the case with Chess of the Wind (Shatranj-e Baad), directed by Iranian film-maker Mohammad Reza Aslani. It was only screened twice in Tehran in 1976, once to a cinema of hostile critics, and then to an empty cinema – the bad reviews had done their work. “The rediscovery of this film is great for me,” says Aslani, now aged 76, and still living in Tehran. “But it also allows audiences to view Iranian cinema from another perspective, and to discover other auteur film-makers who have been marginalised because of the complexity of their films.” Critical of the Shah’s royalist government, the film also featured strong female leads and homosexuality, which didn’t endear it to the Ayatoll...

Star who had a chart-topping solo career with hits such as Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me had complications following heart surgery Mac Davis, who wrote some of Elvis Presley’s biggest hits as well as finding US chart success of his own with a characterful blend of pop, soul and country, has died aged 78. He had suffered complications following heart surgery. His manager Jim Morey announced his death, saying Davis was surrounded by his wife and three sons: “He was a music legend but his most important work was that as a loving husband, father, grandfather and friend.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/30mSuFr

Benjamin Wallace-Wells analyzes the first 2020 Presidential debate, in which President Donald Trump faced off against former Vice-President Joe Biden. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/34dXQno

Earlier this year, the beloved children’s writer spent six weeks on a ventilator with coronavirus. He talks about the magic of the NHS, the mismanagement of the crisis and how his near-death experience has changed him “I’m drinking lemon tea,” Michael Rosen says. “Would you like some? It’s what my mother used to call Russian tea, by the way.” And before I am through the kitchen door of his north London home, he has given me a potted history of Russian tea. It is classic Rosen. Rarely does a sentence pass without the much-loved children’s poet and author teaching you something. There are anecdotes within anecdotes, tangents galore and an astonishing frame of reference – from the Palestinian professor Edward Said on “othering” to the former footballer Gordon Strachan on resilience, the poet Benjamin Zephaniah on us all being migrants and the father of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, on memory banks – and back again. “Sorry to inflict the Arsenal mug on a Man City fan ,” he says with a wi...

A timely new project sees 50 artists and institutions designing stamps to make a statement in a crucial year for US politics In 2020, artists making political statements have typically done so on the streets, with murals, protest placards or by knocking down old monuments. But much overlooked is the envelope as a place for art. Since a stamp symbolizes the mail-in vote, it has come to represent a form of resistance, a form of direct action. The New York non-profit TRANS> has created a stamp project called These Times. The project, which will premiere both online and in sticker format, features 50 artists and institutions who stress the urgency of voting. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3idF3xO

This compelling novel focuses on those enduring German rule in East Africa at the beginning of the twentieth century Until recently, most conversations about the European colonial presence in Africa have excluded Germany. Established in the late 19th century, the German empire on the continent included colonies in present-day Namibia, Cameroon, Togo, parts of Tanzania and Kenya, and eventually claimed the kingdoms of Rwanda and Burundi. German colonial rule was brutal, as colonial enterprises were; in an arena known for its oppression and violence, it is Germany that perpetrated the first genocide of the 20th century in the 1904 extermination campaign to quell the Herero and Nama uprising in Namibia. Across the continent in East Africa, or Deutsch-Ostafrika, Germany ’ s military tactics were equally deadly. Abdulrazak Gurnah’s sprawling yet intimate new novel Afterlives is set against the backdrop of these atrocities. Unfolding in what was then Tanganyika, now mainland Tanzania, it o...

Exam board AQA features no black writers on GCSE English literature syllabus Pupils could complete their GCSEs and leave secondary school in England without studying a single work of literature by a non-white author, research has found. The largest exam board in the country, AQA, does not feature a single book by a black author among set texts for its GCSE English literature syllabus, according to a report by the education charity Teach First. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/30jZcw6

The singer, whose career was celebrated in the 2019 biopic of the same name, had been diagnosed with dementia several years ago Helen Reddy, the Australian singer best known for her anthemic 1972 hit I Am Woman, has died at 78. Reddy had been diagnosed with dementia in 2015 and had been living in a Los Angeles nursing home for professional entertainers. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3jhZI4Z

Charity calls for Victorian and Edwardian ‘survivors of history’ in England and Wales to be saved A long-forgotten London hospital, an imposing former brewery and a circus theatre, described as “fascinating survivors of history”, are among the top 10 most at-risk Victorian and Edwardian listed buildings, according to a charity. The purpose-built hospital opened in 1889 was once one of the country’s most important gynaecological hospitals. It became the Samaritan Free Hospital for Women in 1904, joined the NHS in 1948 and closed in 1997. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3cMenDg

The Oscar-winner will take on a follow-up to the 2019 hit Disney remake which will delve into the mythology of the characters Moonlight Oscar-winner Barry Jenkins is set to direct a follow-up to 2019’s hit remake The Lion King. The writer-director, who won the best adapted screenplay Oscar for the acclaimed gay drama with Tarell Alvin McCraney, confirmed the news on Twitter after Deadline initially reported. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3jdhTZK

Campaign by colour matching company aims to ‘emboldens people who menstruate to feel proud of who they are’ Pantone has unveiled a new shade of red inspired by the colour of women’s periods, as part of a new campaign to end the stigma associated with menstruation. The company, which has the biggest colour matching system in the world, relied on by the global design industry , from graphic design to fashion, product design to printing, said the new shade was “an active and adventurous red hue” that it hoped would “embolden people who menstruate to feel proud of who they are”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/33dkzkv

Baryshnikov couldn’t keep up, Sam Taylor-Wood had a panic attack and Sarah Lucas built him the rudest stage set ever … as a new show celebrates the dance legend, stars pin down his punk genius Les Child , dancer with Michael Clark Company, 1982-89 Before I’d even met Michael I saw him on a poster and was in awe – just because of his amazing proportions. The first time I really saw him dance, he did a solo in a tutu and I was gobsmacked. I started to throw things at him: “You bitch! I didn’t think that was possible!” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/349Ue6b

A sequel to the comedy Borat has been bought by Amazon Prime and was expected to hit the streaming platform before November’s US election.The movie will see British comedian and actor Sacha Baron Cohen reprise his cult favourite role as a bumbling and politically incorrect reporter from Kazakhstan, after nearly 15 years.The 2006 original, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, grossed more than US$260 million, winning over critics and spawning… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3lbxytd

2/5 stars Megan Fox may have battled Transformers and fought alongside the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but few would consider her a legitimate action star like Charlize Theron or Scarlett Johansson. In her new movie Rogue, Fox plays a marine-turned-mercenary, in command of a squad of grizzled combat veterans who regularly risk life and limb to make a quick buck. The actress gives it her all, but it’s hard to believe that her battle-hardened character, Sam O’Hara, even cleared basic training… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/34bRfd8

"It's just unfathomable to imagine another man in that town behaving that graciously or respectfully." from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/30fHJoc

from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/3n44lBS

Fighting Stage IV breast cancer has forced some self-reflection, but the ’90s icon and so-called diva refuses to slow down. from Culture - ELLE https://ift.tt/3mYQEnT

National Gallery, London Artemisia Gentileschi took revenge on her rapist – and the chaotic battlefield of her life – through shockingly violent works. This magnificent show finally secures her reputation as one of the greats This revolutionary exhibition of the work of a forgotten genius is like being on a film set, with the actors right in your face, and the lights revealing who they really are deep down inside. Bodies rush towards you out of the canvas, anguished faces, huge hands, explosions of blood. It’s a thrill ride from beginning to end, a Scorsese film shot in 17th-century Italy’s meanest streets, and it starts with a blow right to the heart. In 1610, the year she turned 17, Artemisia, daughter of the moderately successful artist Orazio Gentileschi, painted a blinding masterpiece in her bedroom. Susanna and the Elders lights a fire in your soul. Susanna sits naked on a grey stone seat, her left foot dipping into the clear waters of a pool she’s just bathed in. But as she re...

Hong Khaou’s thoughtful film speaks to those of us who were forced to move from our homeland home but are now finding a haven in other spaces, from food to family ‘Go home!” or “Go back to where you came from!” are words that people of colour hear and swallow all the time. Having grown up in the UK, such jeers ignite both confusion and anger – as my sense of a community is diminished by the insults of people who are no more British than I am. Related: Monsoon review – sweet times and scented tea in Saigon Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2G05l9L

When the UK version launched, it was like a door opening on a new dimension of astonishing cinematic clarity and thrilling new worlds to explore There was a sense of fundamental cultural change in the air – or that’s how I remember it. Nineteen ninety-five was the year I started out in video game journalism, as a writer for Edge magazine, the most forward-looking gaming publication in the world at the time. My introduction to the industry was booting up a brand new PlayStation and scorching through the UK launch titles. The machine had been available for several months in Japan, and Edge staff had played all the key games in their original NTSC format. They wanted me to catch up. At that time, Edge was on the top floor of Future Publishing’s Beaufort House office, a converted pub, just off Queen’s Square in Bath. While the older legacy publications – Total, Games Master, Sega Power – were crammed in on the ground floor, Edge shared upstairs with the brand new Official PlayStation Maga...

After nine years of fascinating discussion, the Guardian’s Reading group is coming to an end. Tell us your best-loved book and it’ll be in contention to be our book for October This October will be the final month of the Guardian’s Reading group in its current form, so let’s go out with a bang. I want to celebrate the fact that we’ve had fantastic fun – and covered a lot of very good ground in the last nine years. We’ve taken in subjects as different as modernism , science fiction , summer , climate , France , Scotland , Pulitzer prize winners , historical fiction , translated fiction , spy fiction , migration , apocalypse , hope and love . Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3cI0xSo

Lillian Stone humorously explains the origins of certain famous people’s nicknames, including Vlad the Impaler, J. Lo, Alexander the Great, Eminem, and many more. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3ihtaH0

The soap star on her love of Marcella and Schitt’s Creek – and why Ninja Warrior makes her stand on the sofa and shout at the television I was hooked on one of your British productions, Marcella . I’ve got a little iPad set up with my treadmill and there were some days that I was so gripped that I must have done about 16km to try to get to the end of the next episode – that’s how great I thought it was. I like a gritty show, and doing a police drama well is really hard. They didn’t go too over the top with the blood and the gore; it was more about the psychological aspects of the characters and, of course, her journey. What a role for a woman – Anna Friel was terrific. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2SasDvO

Fantastic Beasts star also defends trans friends who face discrimination ‘on a daily basis’ Fantastic Beasts star Eddie Redmayne has said he is alarmed by the “vitriol” aimed at Harry Potter author JK Rowling after her comments on trans rights, adding the reaction on social media was “absolutely disgusting”. Redmayne was speaking to the Daily Mail during the shoot of the third Fantastic Beasts film, which is produced and co-written by Rowling. He said he had sent her a private note. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3n2H9Uz

Katy Waldman reviews “Just Us,” the new book by Claudia Rankine, whose 2014 book “Citizen” probed the nuances and contradictions of being a Black American. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3kWCdyL

On the “Writer’s Voice” podcast, Deborah Treisman hosts the author Joseph O’Neill, who reads his story “Rainbows,” from the October 5, 2020, issue of The New Yorker. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3kUGjaL

Liz Montague discusses how she uses humor and illustration to reflect on larger societal issues, including racial justice and climate change. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/30hP7Q0

The deliverer of electropop’s most withering putdowns talks club culture, workaholism and making French rock cool again Empathy and gentle encouragement are all well and good, but sometimes you need browbeating into action. How else to explain the appeal of fitness instructors, BDSM and Marie Davidson? Since her first dancefloor-adjacent release in 2014, the French-Canadian producer has made intimidation her brand, disparaging the shallow side of club culture and its self-destructive behaviours in a voice that could shrivel ripe plums. It wasn’t just a pose, either. Each record, from Perte d’Identité (identity loss) to Adieu au Dancefloor (goodbye to the dancefloor) to her breakout, 2018’s Working Class Woman , sought enlightenment amid the sadistic aesthetic. The latter was conceived as an “anti-burnout” record, even if lead single Work It, with its exhortations of “sweat dripping down your balls”, was often misinterpreted as a productivity doctrine: the real work, Davidson avowed a...

Arrington helped turn Ohio into America’s funkiest state, but turned away from music for 25 years to work as a minister – and find himself. Now he’s back with a new album Yellow Springs, Ohio, is buzzing, despite it being a weekday afternoon in a pandemic. When Steve Arrington and I meet at a cafe on the town’s main strip, we instinctively reach out our hands to shake. And then, midway, we remember. As we switch to the now-common elbow bump, he sighs. “We do what we can to get by, I guess.” Arrington, 64, is no stranger to adaptation. His career as one of the greatest funk stars in the US began on the underground scene in nearby Dayton just as it began to take off in the mid-1970s. Arrington’s older brother was in bands, and some of the best funk drummers of the era would come to the family home and play while a young Steve sat on the steps. They would give him permission to play on their kits when they weren’t using them, and this is how Arrington drummed his way into bands througho...

ITV’s two-part drama about the case of murdered 20-year-old Banaz Mahmod is a chilling reminder of how society failed to protect a young woman from harm It’s DCI Caroline Goode’s first day in the job. In the time-honoured tradition of sexism in the workplace, her big promotion begins with a good-natured ribbing by the young male DS in her team. “You should show a bit more respect to your new boss,” bats back Goode, played by Keeley Hawes. “First job, day one,” says DS Andy Craig as they walk up a grim corridor to an office full of bulky computer monitors and predominantly white officers. “Let’s hope it’s a good one.” Goode firmly replies: “They’re all good ones.” This is how Honour (ITV) opens. The lens is tightly focused not on the real-life case that follows – the rape, torture, and murder of 20-year-old Banaz Mahmod in 2006 by five members of her family – but on Goode’s laudable resolve to bring Mahmod’s killers to justice. For this, Honour has been criticised – which is understan...

Launched into obscurity in 2018 but now hugely popular, this online version of wink murder, with its focus on fabrication and blame-shifting, is scarily on point There are 10 crew members trapped on a spacecraft, carrying out menial tasks to maintain vital systems, but at least one of them is an imposter who wants to sabotage their work and if possible, murder them. What sounds like the premise of a particularly bleak science-fiction movie is in fact the set-up of one of the most popular video games of the year. Developed by a three-person team at InnerSloth and launched to virtual obscurity in 2018, Among Us has suddenly become one of the biggest games on PC and mobile, attracting more than 85m players in the last six months. It’s so successful, InnerSloth recently abandoned plans to work on a sequel, instead piling their resources into the original. No one, it seems, is more surprised about the success of this game than its creators. So why has this happened? Among Us is essentiall...

Perhaps we have all taken privilege of music for granted, writes the conductor. Only by taking it away do we realise how essential it is. After seven months of musical silence, I feel very fortunate to be giving a public concert this week with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra . The auditorium in Glasgow’s City Halls will be empty, but people can still listen to the performance live thanks to a simultaneous broadcast on Radio 3 . Invisible listeners are not ideal, but in the context of this year a live orchestral experience of any sort is much appreciated. A musician’s need to be heard is not just psychological inspiration, needy approbation, or box office compensation. We need audiences because without anyone listening, the music doesn’t exist – merely proverbial trees falling unheard in the distant forest. Early humans didn’t start to play music because they liked the noise it made. They sang, hit, bowed or blew to communicate with each other. There was no significant difference ...

Novelist Richard Flanagan talks about the themes in his new book – grief and loss, but also possibility, and the beauty of a disappearing world About half an hour into our conversation, I ask Richard Flanagan what gives him hope. There’s a pause down the phone line, the hiss of empty, mechanical air. Gaps and silences are not unusual in a phone call with Australia’s most recent Booker Prize winner. Not because he’s lost for words – that’s not his style – but because Flanagan is a deeply thoughtful, deeply considered conversationalist. His words are precise, carefully chosen, carrying import and meaning. To be clear, his magnificent new book The Living Sea of Waking Dreams is hopeful. It is bleak at times, a book about a disappearing world, about loss and grief, about familial failures of empathy and societal failures of attention. But it is also playful; with an eye for absurdity and a darkly funny streak. It is a novel that unmistakably has been written against the backdrop of Austr...

When film-maker Kirsten Johnson’s father developed dementia, she decided to make an unusual Netflix documentary that challenges our notions of reality We’re living in boom times for non-fiction cinema, what may be one of the most creatively fertile periods in the history of the American documentary. Aside from the more obvious breakout hits, there’s a small but exciting movement of boundary-pushing films that endeavor to deconstruct and expand our understanding of the form, a set of innovative screen experiments that find elusive truths through contrived circumstances. Related: The Mole Agent: the story of the most unusual documentary of the year Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/33a35W0

Young musicians plucked from the ranks of the Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra (HKCO) have created three adventurous concert programmes for the troupe’s abbreviated new season that starts in October.Pipa virtuoso Belle Shiu Pui-yee from Hong Kong, Shanghai-born huqin player Li Xiaoding, and daruan principal Lau Yuek-lam from Kaohsiung, Taiwan, hope their programme choices will strengthen the contemporary voice of the 91-strong orchestra of Chinese traditional instrument players.Shiu, for instance,… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3cGqeCP

He is a titan of the artworld whose work can be savage, prescient or slapstick. Ahead of a major show, the US artist looks back on studio stunts and liquid lunches with legends Bruce Nauman is telling me a story from his childhood. “I had a friend in high school who was a little bit of a loner,” says the artist, speaking by phone from New York. “If someone hit him with a snowball when we were walking to school, he wouldn’t just throw a snowball back, he’d attack. He’d get ’em down on the ground and pound on him.” It is a story that seems to chime with Nauman’s art, where the line between peaceable interaction and sudden violence often seems terrifyingly thin. The artist, about to be the subject of a retrospective at London’s Tate Modern, is interested in the moment a social ritual or game pivots into cruelty. In the 1986 video work Violent Incident , a smartly dressed couple are at a table set for cocktails and dinner – but the date soon descends into a vicious brawl. You can feel pu...

Hundreds of women and children performed forced labor in Nazi times. A psychologist has launched a campaign to remember their lives with "stumbling stones." from Deutsche Welle: DW.com - Culture & Lifestyle https://ift.tt/2S2ciJP

Willing Davidson interviews the author Joseph O’Neill about “Rainbows,” his story from the October 5, 2020, issue of The New Yorker. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3kTX1Ho

Imagine a President determined to do something about the destruction of democracy, Susan B. Glasser writes. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cGQv3F

Shouts & Murmurs by Paul Rudnick: “I’m an easygoing, accepting person, despite the restraining orders from multiple parties who tried to argue that street parking spaces are ‘open to everyone.’ ” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cGQBs3

How Do Senators Sleep at Night? from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2FWRuRz

“Ellis Island,” “Think Least of Death,” “The Appointment,” and “His Only Wife.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3ialExN

New cartoons from the magazine. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2Ghi738

Ann Patchett writes that, when it came to fathers, her problems were not those of scarcity but those of abundance. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2G98Mef

Private investigators have been touted as an antidote to corruption and a force for transparency. But they’ve also become another weapon in the hands of corporate interests, Patrick Radden Keefe writes. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cBYYoQ

It would be a relief simply to have a President who doesn’t abuse the office as a colossal grift. But a new President must also address the failures that have been festering in American life for decades. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/335y9pY

Poetry by Jacob Sunderlin: “He guns / his rebuilt truck to say it: everything broken // gets fixed.” from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2G96ZFT

The BBC sitcom hinges on the spirited relationship between its two stars. Yet there’s more to the man who plays Mike – including a novelty grime hit about chicken In the BBC sitcom Ghosts , two modern-day herberts, Mike and Alison, inherit a mansion populated by ancestral spirits. You’d think viewers would be outraged by the absurdity of ghosts who can pass through walls while walking on solid ground, or the implausibility of twentysomethings’ first step on the property ladder being a 14-bedroom hall, but no. Instead, in 2020, some are more perturbed by the fact that Mike is black and Alison white. “I’ve seen a lot of comments about that and even if you look at the trailer on YouTube there’s people complaining that, ‘It’s all interracial couples on television nowadays’,” says Kiell Smith-Bynoe , who plays Mike. “I understand that’s how some people feel.” Then, over the video link from his home, Bynoe-Smith gives me a cheeky grin. “And it also makes me a bit happy. I’m like, ‘You can ...

Sacha Baron Cohen said to have test-screened follow-up to his 2006 hit, which was shot during the pandemic Reports that Sacha Baron Cohen has filmed and test-screened a sequel to his 2006 comedy hit, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan , have gathered pace with the news that a title for the film was submitted to the Writers Guild America. Borat: Gift of Pornographic Monkey to Vice Premiere Mikhael Pence to Make Benefit Recently Diminished Nation of Kazakhstan was submitted to the Writers Guild America in recent days, but the page has since been taken down. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/368k6BY

Director Victor Kossakovsky, who worked with Phoenix on new film Gunda, says couple’s first child is named after Joaquin’s late brother, actor River Phoenix Joaquin Phoenix, who won an Oscar this year for his role in the film Joker, has reportedly welcomed his first child with fiancee Rooney Mara. They named the baby boy after Phoenix’s late brother, River, who died in 1993. The director Victor Kossakovsky revealed the news at the 2020 Zurich film festival after a screening of the black-and-white documentary Gunda . Joaquin was an executive producer on the film. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/36eTEGD

R&B legend tells of channelling 90s singers – ‘angry, angsty, and messy, with old shoes’ for alt-rock album with the band Chick With her immaculate, glamorous image, Mariah Carey is the last person you’d expect to don a plaid shirt, ripped denim and mope over a squall of electric guitars. But the R&B singer has revealed that she channelled singers who were “angry, angsty, and messy, with old shoes” for a secret alt-rock project in 1995. Carey worked with the band Chick on their album Someone’s Ugly Daughter, writing, producing and singing backing vocals on every song . In an excerpt from her forthcoming memoir, she writes: Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3i3rbpK

The 40th edition of the Hong Kong Film Awards, originally scheduled for early 2021, has been postponed for a year to 2022 because of the Covid-19 pandemic, organisers announced on Monday.The Hong Kong Film Awards Association said in a special circular that the postponement was a consequence of Hong Kong cinemas not “operating normally” this year, with the result that film releases have been repeatedly put on hold.As part of the Hong Kong government’s measures to contain the coronavirus, cinemas… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3i4bGhe

The author of Gilead on the Black Lives Matter protests, the dangers of social media, and her latest novel, Jack Marilynne Robinson is an American novelist and essayist. One of Barack Obama’s favourite authors, she won the Pulitzer prize for fiction in 2005 for her novel Gilead . This was the first in a trilogy of books that chronicle the spiritual journeys of two families in a fictional mid-western town. Her new book, Jack , returns to the most enigmatic character in the series, as he embarks on an interracial relationship in segregated St Louis. Robinson lives in Iowa , where she set her Gilead novels. Your new book reacquaints us with the sad and troubled world of Jack Boughton , the wayward son of a small-town Presbyterian minister. What made you decide to revisit his story? Jack was still on my mind. When I am writing a novel I find that characters become well known and important to me out of all proportion to their place in that particular fiction. And it seemed to me also th...

Actor claims mainstream politicians have ‘lost touch with the people’ The actor Laurence Fox has announced he is launching a political party to “reclaim” British values from politicians, who he says have “lost touch with the people”. In a statement on Twitter , the 42-year-old member of an acting dynasty that includes his father, James, and his cousin Emilia, said the party would aim to provide a “new political movement which promises to make our future a shared endeavour, not a divisive one”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3czoNWJ

Designing Disorder by Richard Sennett and Pablo Sendra, Verso. Richard Sennett said it 50 years ago in The Uses of Disorder and he is saying it still: our cities should be less prescriptive and more uncertain. Only then will their inhabitants be able to enjoy, and benefit from, the complexity of experiences that may evolve. In Designing Disorder, co-written with architect/activist Pablo Sendra, the American urbanist-cum-sociologist makes the most of a second opportunity to rail at the… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3mYnAgk

As Fight the Power is reworked for the age of Black Lives Matter, rap’s elder statesman gives his message for the US election – and explains the ‘hoax’ firing of Flavor Flav It is 1989 and racial tensions in the US are simmering. Public Enemy have just released Fight the Power on Def Jam, with a video featuring a massive political rally, the Young People’s March to End Racial Violence. Fast-forward 31 years and Public Enemy are back on Def Jam and Fight the Power, immortalised in Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing , has been reworked in response to the Black Lives Matter protests that spread across the US and beyond. The intervening years have seen all the hope surrounding Barack Obama, the US’s first black president, being replaced by the fear and divisiveness caused by Donald Trump . So it is unsurprising that Chuck D is finding it hard to see progress. In his distinctive baritone, Public Enemy’s leader and founder says Black Lives Matter “has made a difference – but you know, it’...

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David Remnick on a new report in the New York Times that Donald Trump paid only $750 in income tax during the first two years of his Presidency, among other bombshell revelations. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3i6Shwg

Japanese actress Yuko Takeuchi was found dead at her family home in Tokyo on Sunday morning by her husband, the actor Taiki Nakabayashi.The cause of death is presumed to be suicide, making the 40-year-old mother of two the latest in a string of high-profile performers in Japan to take their own lives in recent months, following the deaths of Sei Ashina earlier this month and Haruma Miura in July.A prolific film and television actress, Takeuchi found fame in the 1996 Fuji TV drama Cyborg, and… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/30uQ9IP

ZZ Packer writes about the decision by a grand jury in Louisville, Kentucky, not to charge the three officers who fired at Breonna Taylor for a crime directly related to her death. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/36g79WH

Sue Halpern writes about efforts by the Democratic Party and affiliated nonprofit groups to register new voters ahead of the 2020 election. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2G8KLnb

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John Rego humorously imagines New York City apartment listings for 2020. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/334vnkP

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Archaelogists say the Sumerian plaque dating from around 2400BC may have been looted An ancient sculpture is to be returned to Iraq after it was secretly smuggled out of the country and offered for sale in the UK – only to be seized by the Metropolitan police. The previously unknown Sumerian temple plaque – dating from about 2400BC – is being repatriated with the help of the British Museum, which first tipped off the police after spotting its planned sale in 2019. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FXB3EC

The Observer revisits six theatre bosses appointed in 2019 to discuss the existential threat to their industry, and the fightback Last summer, the Observer profiled a group of newly-appointed artistic directors – a fresh surge of talent taking its place at the top of six of our best-loved theatre companies. A notably diverse cohort, they were bursting with optimism and ideas for shaking up the industry. Our theatre critic Susannah Clapp , introducing the new talent, looked forward to seeing how they would transform the theatrical landscape – with the caveat that “it is hard, though, to guess what changes will be wrought”. No one predicted the cataclysmic changes they would all have to reckon with in their first year. “Everyone would like to go back to ‘precedented’ times, wouldn’t they?” says Sean Foley, artistic director for Birmingham Rep, who had arrived full time at the theatre in February – only to shut it within a month. The job, he says, is certainly “not what I bargained for...

From Ant and Dec, through the Rodham-Clintons, to the Knowles-Carters, some people work better when they’re part of a duo There is something about the “power of two” in our culture, a unique, contained bond that can form between two people and generate a particular catalysing spark. We are fascinated by “odd couples” but not odd trios; we love watching double acts and obsess over Hollywood couples; so many great achievements seem to have been the work of dual partnerships: Lennon and McCartney; Marie and Pierre Curie; French and Saunders. But what is that something? Perhaps one of the reasons I’m so drawn to duos like this is that I am not a natural collaborator. As a child, I ploughed my own furrow and was, I suspect, rather similar to Briony, the hero of Ian McEwan’s novel Atonement : “One of those children possessed by a desire to have the world just so.” Briony not only writes the play she puts on at the start, but designs the posters, programmes and tickets – and constructs the ...

Theatre photographer Simon Annand has been snapping actors backstage for almost four decades. His latest book, Time to Act , is a collection of more than 200 portraits of some of the world’s greatest performers. Here are 12 of the best All photographs: Simon Annand Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3341z7Y

In an excerpt from their forthcoming book, Susan B. Glasser and Peter Baker write about James A. Baker III, the former Secretary of State, Treasury Secretary, and White House chief of staff, who has professed disillusionment with President Donald Trump but who believes he cannot vote against Trump without abandoning the Republican Party. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/2HEkazj

From The New Yorker’s archive: pieces by Wallace White, Calvin Tomkins, Alec Wilkinson, Susan Orlean, Francis Steegmuller, Mark Levine, Namwali Serpell, David Grann, and Lauren Collins that offer an intriguing look at the lives of those who dare to venture beyond the ordinary. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3i8QeI3

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/3mXoxVZ

He thought he was washed up before he’d started. Now, using politicians’ words against them, Michael Spicer is part of a new wave of satirists finding success outside TV Michael Spicer has been trying – mostly failing – to make it as a comedian for the best part of two decades. As a teenager, Spicer amassed enough rejection letters to wallpaper the spare bedroom of his family home. (He was a precocious teenager.) Spicer kept plugging away at comedy writing throughout his 20s and 30s, pitching to TV commissioners but receiving unending rejections. “A lot of the stuff I wrote wasn’t quite good enough,” he admits. It wasn’t that Spicer wasn’t getting anywhere at all – “I would always touch the surface of success,” he says – but he certainly wasn’t getting anywhere fast. Parts in BBC satirical comedy The Mash Report , hosted by Nish Kumar, and the Diane Morgan sitcom Mandy were promising, but they weren’t enough to make ends meet, so Spicer took a job writing copy for a shipping company...

She runs from bees and hates planes. But with acting, Sarah Paulson is scared of nothing. She talks about her roles in American Horror Story and Ratched – and about her ‘creative marriage’ with screenwriter Ryan Murphy I got a report yesterday saying it was up by…” Sarah Paulson pauses, weighing up whether she wants to reveal the extent of her daily screen time. Then she takes the plunge. “It was nine hours and 52 minutes,” she says, mock-abashed. In a day ? She nods. “In a day, yes. Quite terrible. I think it was… doesn’t it break down how much of it was work? There was work on there. So I was doing some of that. But… it’s embarrassing.” We are at the start of another long screen day for Paulson, who is speaking from her kitchen, at home in Los Angeles. Her new dog, Winifred, is curled up just out of shot. “Winnie! Would you like to come and say hi?” she coos, in a squeaky voice. “I’m this person! Who does this voice when I talk to my dog!” Winnie is her first dog in nine-and-a-hal...

A Texas single mother is determined her daughter will win the local pageant to gain a college scholarship in this beautifully observed debut feature Earlier this year, Philippa Lowthorpe’s socio-comedy Misbehaviour entertainingly addressed the intersection between sexism and racism through the bizarre real-life pageantry of the disrupted 1970 Miss World competition in London. A very different pageant plays out in Fort Worth, Texas, in this impressive debut feature from writer-director Channing Godfrey Peoples. Following a mother’s attempts to pass her own interrupted ambitions on to her teenage daughter, Miss Juneteenth is a beautifully observed and quietly powerful drama that applies its coming-of-age tropes to children, parents and politics alike. Nicole Beharie , who played Rachel Robinson to Chadwick Boseman’s Jackie in 42 , is Turquoise Jones, a former beauty queen (she keeps her crown in a box) juggling shifts at Wayman’s BBQ bar, and at the local funeral parlour. “I will nev...

Philip Guston depicted ‘the banality of evil’ but galleries in the UK and US fear his work could be misinterpreted Best known for his abstract art, Philip Guston also dipped into figurative painting with a repeating motif of white-hooded Ku Klux Klan members. Now these images have caused the postponement of a major retrospective to honour him – and a heated row within the art world. Four institutions – the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Tate in London – have said their Philip Guston Now exhibition won’t open before 2024 because it needs to be framed by “additional perspectives and voices”. They want to wait until the “message of social and racial justice” at the centre of his work “can be more clearly interpreted”. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/36cfHhk

A new exhibition by African-American painter Titus Kaphar challenges its audience to see pictures in a new way – by literally adding black faces In his painting for the cover of the June edition of Time magazine, published in the wake of the killing of George Floyd, American artist Titus Kaphar portrayed the pain of the grieving African-American mother. Eyes closed, a black woman in a pose evocative of the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus, holds an outline where her child should be. The painting made Kaphar a figure of hate for some, who felt it had no place on the front of the prestigious publication. “It became a place to put their anger and frustration,” he says. “It was another example of how Black Lives Matter was destroying the country.” Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/33XPDUq

The singer-songwriter tells Desert Island Discs about walking away from his fans, and the difficulties of following a spiritual path The singer-songwriter now known as Yusuf Cat Stevens has spoken of the pain of his decision to leave music behind in 1977, when he first converted to Islam, and of the difficulty of being used as a representative of an entire faith. “It was a hard tug. I felt a responsibility to my fans, but I would have been a hypocrite. I needed to get real. So I stopped singing and started taking action with what I now believed,” he said. The singer, who first performed as Cat Stevens, adopted the name Yusuf Islam when he changed faith. He now uses both first names. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2EByQhg

Artist Claerwen James on growing up with an extraordinary father – and how she bonded with him in his final months when they compiled an anthology of his favourite verse Ten months before his death last year at the age of 80, Clive James underwent an eight-hour operation to remove a tumour on his face. Already very frail – he had been suffering from leukaemia for a decade – afterwards it took him almost a week to emerge fully into consciousness. “And even then, he was foggy,” says his daughter, the artist Claerwen James. “He couldn’t really see, which meant he couldn’t really read – and that had never been the case before.” For her father, this was not a small thing, whatever the size of his other problems. Words were his life raft. But all was not lost. “The resource that he did have was the poetry he knew,” she says. “And he wanted to hear it. He’d recite a bit – sometimes, he’d have only a verse – and whoever was sitting with him would look up the next part, and read it to him. H...

Tom Hollander and co are just right in David Nicholls’s adaptation of his 2014 bestseller. Meanwhile Grayson Perry gets to the heart of America and Bake Off rises to the occasion Us (BBC One) | iPlayer Criminal (Netflix) | Netflix The Great British Bake Off (Channel 4) | All 4 Grayson Perry’s Big American Road Trip (Channel 4) | All 4 Ghosts (BBC One) | iPlayer I was glad to see the adaptation of Us looming in my headlights a couple of weeks ago, because it gave me an excuse to order the book, and I’d quite forgotten how consistently smart and charming a writer is David Nicholls . Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2G3a6zg

Chinese hip-hop star Gai has come a long way since he first appeared as a contestant on season one of the hit music reality show The Rap of China three years ago.In the current fourth season of the show, Gai – real name Zhou Yan – has moved from contestant to judge alongside other stars including Kris Wu Yifan and Wilber Pan. It’s a spectacular achievement for Zhou, who just three years ago was virtually unknown.“I want to thank The Rap of China for nurturing me,” Zhou tells the South China… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/2HrZ3jk

Racism has a long and ignoble history as a pillar of American law enforcement. But San Francisco in the late 1870s had bigger problems than bigoted policemen and their venal city hall overseers, or even gangs of rough-hewn Irish labourers promulgating, with clubs, knives and dynamite, the anti-“coolie” and “yellow peril out” message. As we return to the emerging city by the bay for the explosive second series of period thriller Warrior , San Francisco is just a swinging nunchaku away from a… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/3kQf94L

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The singer-songwriter on how Hong Kong inspired her new album, why she then had to leave, and the first thing she’ll do when we’re Covid-free Emma-Lee Moss, 36, has recorded four albums as Emmy the Great, including her forthcoming LP, April /月音, inspired by explorations of her Hong Kong-Chinese identity (her mother is from Hong Kong, where Emmy lived until she was 12). She is also a soundtrack composer, journalist and radio documentary maker. She lives in London with her partner and 20-month-old daughter. On 17 October she plays one of the Barbican’s autumn series of live concerts, which will also be streamed for digital audiences. What made you want to explore your Hong Kong life through music? Every album I’ve done has felt like it was working something out and I felt this would be about figuring out how to get home. I was living in New York in 2017 and I’d had two places I called home – England and Hong Kong. One minute, I was visiting my parents thinking about writing some songs ...

South Korean super label SM Entertainment formally introduced NCT 2020 this month. The large-scale music project brings together the 23 members of SM’s ambitious K-pop boy band venture NCT for a series of new songs and videos.While it’s already tough to stand out in the South Korean music industry, it’s even harder when you’re standing alongside 22 other idols. Here’s how NCT Dream member Jaemin has matched his peers and set himself up for an exciting, multifaceted career.His early lifeNa Jae… from South China Morning Post https://ift.tt/341cq1x

Amy Coney Barrett’s elevation to fill Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat at the Supreme Court would fulfill former Justice Lewis Powell’s plan to transform the Court into a forum friendly to business interests, Jeffrey Toobin writes. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cyeGBc

The musician, 46, on the Spice Girls’ fiery combination, grappling with lockdown and the lows of being famous I had a lot of success with the Spice Girls , but in my 30s there were times when I believed my moment had passed; that I should just go out to pasture. Now in my mid-40s I’ve decided: sod that. I started my career telling women to go out and get what they want, and there I was thinking it was all over. Mum signed a record deal in the 1970s but it didn’t work out, so she played the pubs and the clubs through my childhood. I’d sit in the crowd, singing along. But knowing her story made me believe my own dream was unattainable. I’m just so pleased my aspiration to be the next Madonna persisted. Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2EyCnge

As his third novel is published, the television presenter talks about growing older, Eurovision and resuming his talk show in a pandemic Graham Norton is chipper as we chat in West Cork, where he spends much of his time when his eponymous BBC TV show is not on air, and to which he has repaired during lockdown. Despite the disappointing weather – Storm Ellen is about to wreak havoc on the west, and the following week will bring flooded roads and power outages across the area – and the daily waves of worse and worse news, he’s been quietly getting on with his other career, and the publication of his third novel, Home Stretch . “You know,” he says, “when I was rereading the proofs, it was in lockdown, Black Lives Matter and the world going to hell in a handcart, and I sort of thought, I’ve written an incredibly Pollyanna version of the world. But even if I have it’s a version of the world I like.” It’s a lighthearted characterisation of his writing, but not entirely accurate. Although ...

Nikki Palumbo’s humorous take on apple-picking season in New York. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3cyXEmB

Remember hugging? There’s a strange appeal in watching TV filmed in the ‘before times’, under Fred Sirieix’s vigilant eye First Dates is back! And you’ll be pleased to know it is exactly the same as before. Fred Sirieix still says “Ooh la–la!” when a glamorously made-up woman turns up in a dress to eat dinner with a man in a T-shirt. Merlin is always there behind the bar, a Dracularian butler trapped in the body of bartender, asking what you do for a living. There are all the waiting staff, looking unerringly attractive throughout, primed as if to always descend into a slithering orgy as soon as Fred blows his ceremonial French sex whistle. Related: The Guide: Staying In – sign up for our home entertainment tips Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/3i3mJar

Matt Alt on how alt-right Web sites like 4chan and Japan’s 2channel spout homophobia, nationalism, anti-feminism, and white-supremacy ideologies, and such conspiracies as QAnon. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/36aX11E

Louisa Thomas writes that on the surface, the Denver Nuggets’ players Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokić seem to be each other’s antitheses, but something strange has been happening during the 2020 N.B.A. playoffs. from Culture: TV, Movies, Music, Art, and Theatre News and Reviews https://ift.tt/3kHE3Ue

From Slayer to Mean Girls, Alexis Petridis, Peter Bradshaw and others look back at the films, TV, music and more they’ve had second thoughts about Modern Toss on critics ... Then Crushingly disappointing follow-up Now Arguably the most influential album of the past 20 years Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2FSxakh

From starring roles in Moonlight and Hidden Figures, to a genre-busting musical career, the actor and singer has always gone her own way A downside, perhaps, to the sheer imaginative power of Janelle Mon áe is that it’s hard not to bring unreasonable expectations to any conversation one has with her. The musician and actor is on the phone from her home in Los Angeles, where for the last six months she has been sitting out lockdown. Monáe’s music career is dominated by sci-fi imagery, thrilling story arcs and inventiveness of a kind that has earned her comparisons to Prince , with whom she worked and could go toe-to-toe, not only on talent but also outlandish wardrobe decisions. The voice on the line, by contrast, is quiet, serious and devoid of all whimsy. She’s also terrifically earnest. To give an idea: Monáe is 34 but, asked to confirm her age, she says with what sounds like complete sincerity: “I’m timeless.” She isn’t wrong, in a way; there is something about Monáe’s work that ...

So much of the publishing industry is shaped by pure emotion – and the Booker prize is no exception “Too many debuts/Americans/same names … ” Every year, without fail, the Booker prize shortlist ruffles feathers. Well, not just the shortlist, as we saw from last year’s joint winners. This year’s “drama” surrounds the double Booker winner Hilary Mantel being absent from the shortlist. To those questioning the omission of The Mirror & the Light , Lee Child, one of the judges, said: “As good as it was, there were six that were better.” And in his subjective opinion, yes, that is true. Related: Most diverse Booker prize shortlist ever as Hilary Mantel misses out Continue reading... from Culture | The Guardian https://ift.tt/335nueS

The notorious 1970 prosecution that exposed police harassment of black Britons is brilliantly evoked as part of the director’s Small Axe project Vivid, immediate and impassioned, this new movie episode in Small Axe, Steve McQueen’s five-part film series for the BBC, is about the Mangrove Nine case in 1970 . A group of black British campaigners were tried on charges including incitement to riot after demonstrating against police harassment of the Mangrove in London’s Notting Hill, a restaurant that had become a meeting point for activists. After not-guilty verdicts were returned in most cases, the peppery trial judge, Edward Clarke (played here by Alex Jennings ), clearly irritated by the transparently untruthful police testimony as much as by the defendants’ rebellious behaviour in court, remarked that there had been “racial hatred on both sides”. He naturally intended that as a rebuke to the leftists, a moral equivalence whose purpose was to annul the whole question of official raci...

What makes great poetry? An exclusive extract from the late critic’s final book The Fire of Joy celebrates the poems he loved most The French expression feu de joie refers to a military celebration when all the riflemen of a regiment fire one shot after another, in close succession: ideally the sound should be continuous, like a drumroll. I first saw a feu de joie performed at an Australian army tattoo, in the main arena at the Sydney Showground, while I was still in short trousers. Later on, when I was doing national service in longer trousers, I saw the ceremony performed again, on the parade ground in Ingleburn, New South Wales, in 1958. Symbolically, the fire of joy is a reminder that the regiment’s collective power relies on the individual, and vice versa. Imprinted on my mind, the succession of explosions became an evocation of the heritage of English poets and poetry, from Chaucer onwards. It still strikes me as a handy metaphor for the poetic succession, especially because,...