Arts Reviews

The good, bad and ugly in arts and exhbitions

Saturday

Deborah Ross

Second sight

Although I can’t generally get too worked up about remakes, just as I can’t get too worked up about most things these days — too old; too tired; too long in what teeth I still have left (four, I think) — I suppose this Brighton Rock does have its work cut out. Although I can’t generally get too worked up about remakes, just as I can’t get too worked up about most things these days — too old; too tired; too long in what teeth I still have left (four, I think) — I suppose this Brighton Rock does have its work cut out. The director Rowan Joffe, who also

Lloyd Evans

Trouble at home

The Almeida relishes its specialist status. The boss, Michael Attenborough, isn’t keen on celebrity casting because he wants ‘the theatre to be the star’. It’s a niche operation for purists and connoisseurs, for seekers and searchers, and for those who can spell Verfremdungseffekt without having to check (as I just had to) what the penultimate letter is. We’re privileged to have a theatre in London that wants to raise the bar rather than the bar prices. The Almeida relishes its specialist status. The boss, Michael Attenborough, isn’t keen on celebrity casting because he wants ‘the theatre to be the star’. It’s a niche operation for purists and connoisseurs, for seekers

Michael Tanner

Animal magic

The annual collaboration between Scottish Opera and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama is, as the principal of the RSAMD writes, ‘a model…for partnership working between professionals and professionals-in-training’, and it is hard to think of any work more suitable for this partnership than Janácek’s The Cunning Little Vixen. The annual collaboration between Scottish Opera and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama is, as the principal of the RSAMD writes, ‘a model…for partnership working between professionals and professionals-in-training’, and it is hard to think of any work more suitable for this partnership than Janácek’s The Cunning Little Vixen. The 76 players in the orchestra include 21

Kate Chisholm

Save the World Service

All this talk about cuts might not be such a bad thing, if it forces us to think about what really should not be left to rot and wither away for lack of funding. Take the BBC’s World Service. Do we really need it in these post-imperial times? After all, it was set up in 1932 so that the King could keep in touch with his subjects, day and night, around the globe, wherever they might be. Those first broadcasts rather touchingly suggested that the King and his representatives in Whitehall actually cared about what happened to the peoples of Togo, Tanganyika and Christchurch, NZ. But, as The King’s Speech

Simon Hoggart

Grown-up viewing

Sky’s new channel, Atlantic, kicked off this week with two big shows: Boardwalk Empire, which is set in 1920 and is about gangsters, and Blue Bloods, which is set in the modern day and is about a family of New York law enforcers. Sky’s new channel, Atlantic, kicked off this week with two big shows: Boardwalk Empire, which is set in 1920 and is about gangsters, and Blue Bloods, which is set in the modern day and is about a family of New York law enforcers. As in all American cop shows, there is a lot of badge-flashing, though for some reason none of the people they flash their badges

Friday

Rod Liddle

Keep your distance in the Middle East

There was a fabulously daft and self regarding woman called Marina something or other talking about Egypt on Question Time last night. In a prize for the Most Useless Woman Ever to Appear On Question Time she would certainly be in the top five, although probably below Katie Hopkins. I was supposed to be on this week but couldn’t face the journey back from Workington: I assume Melanie Phillips was my replacement. The Egypt business continues to baffle the west. Truth is, foul although the despotic leaders of most middle eastern countries undoubtedly are, they are more liberal and more pleasant than almost anything the people of that region yearn

Tuesday

Kate Maltby

Fake Shakes(peare)

    Plaster the name ‘William Shakespeare’ on your theatre posters, and you’re sure to get bums on seats – even if Shakespeare didn’t quite write the play in question. That’s the rationale behind the slew of productions of the mysterious Cardenio, or Double Falsehood, the latest of which has opened at the Union Theatre.  This latest production is fresh and pacy – and buoyed by energetic performances by Emily Plumtree, Emily Plumtree and Adam Redmore – but it’s hard to watch without a gnawing sense of astonishment at the chutzpah of the company’s claim to place this flimsy curio alongside masterpieces like Macbeth or Measure for Measure. There are

Sunday

Nick Cohen

1981 and all that

LP Hartley could not have been more wrong. The past is not a foreign country to which we can never return. It fills the minds of the living and stops us seeing the present clearly. My Observer colleague Andrew Rawnsley tells our nervous readers this morning that David Cameron and George Osborne have no Plan B for the economy. They believe they are right and will not change course, in part because the myths of the past possess them, specifically the myth of 1981. “The final reason why they do not have a Plan B flows from the way they interpret history. The prime minister and the chancellor are keen

Saturday

Mark Greaves

Hand of destruction

Mark Greaves talks to the artist Peter Howson about his latest commission and his demons Peter Howson started hallucinating last summer. Lying awake at night, he saw what he describes as ‘devils, demons and goblins’. They told him there was no point in living; that he might as well do away with himself. It was, he says, probably the worst year of his life. He felt as if he had been abandoned by God. At times he says he couldn’t really walk or see. He made himself feel better by reading the Book of Job — in which Job’s children die, his possessions are destroyed and his skin covered in

James Walton

Numb to fiction

In the recent EastEnders cot-death controversy, both sides behaved pretty much as you’d expect. The BBC-bashers denounced the ‘offensive’ suggestion that grieving mothers routinely steal other people’s babies. In the recent EastEnders cot-death controversy, both sides behaved pretty much as you’d expect. The BBC-bashers denounced the ‘offensive’ suggestion that grieving mothers routinely steal other people’s babies. The corporation itself used words like ‘challenging’ and ‘sensitive’ — before caving in to the criticism. Yet, surely the most (and possibly sole) interesting thing about the debate was the confirmation that we’re in danger of becoming, in Philip Roth’s words, ‘numb to fiction’. And in this, I’m afraid, television has only itself to

Andrew Lambirth

New look

There has already been a certain amount of controversy over this exhibition: not just the predictably ruffled feathers of Royal Academicians omitted from the selection, but also the kind of ill feeling among the Academy’s organisational staff which gives a museum a bad name. There has already been a certain amount of controversy over this exhibition: not just the predictably ruffled feathers of Royal Academicians omitted from the selection, but also the kind of ill feeling among the Academy’s organisational staff which gives a museum a bad name. This is a great pity, as the exhibition is a remarkable one — out of 12 rooms, eight contain some of the

Deborah Ross

Leaden mess

Hereafter is directed by Clint Eastwood, produced by Clint Eastwood and Steven Spielberg, and written by Peter Morgan, although what would attract one of these big names to such a project, let alone three, is anyone’s guess. Hereafter is directed by Clint Eastwood, produced by Clint Eastwood and Steven Spielberg, and written by Peter Morgan, although what would attract one of these big names to such a project, let alone three, is anyone’s guess. Honestly, I had more fun this week doing my tax return which, every year, nicely reminds me what a pitiful amount of money I earn and what a total loser I am. Did Peter (Frost/Nixon; The

Michael Tanner

No-hoper

As I sat fuming through the latest absurd production of Carmen, this one directed by the controversial Daniel Kramer for Opera North, it struck me that this opera, like one other of the trio of popular masterpieces set in or around Seville, Mozart’s Don Giovanni, suffers because its central figure leads a separate life of her or his own; though they are most famous in the context of these works. As I sat fuming through the latest absurd production of Carmen, this one directed by the controversial Daniel Kramer for Opera North, it struck me that this opera, like one other of the trio of popular masterpieces set in or

Lloyd Evans

Losing the plot

An all-Hall haul this week. Sir Peter directs his daughter Rebecca in Twelfth Night at the National. This traditional and very fetching production opens in a sort of Elizabethan rock-star mansion where Orsino (Marton Csokas) lounges on a carved throne, in Lemmy locks and Ozzy cape, intoning the play’s gorgeous opening lyrics. Then the plot begins. There’s a she who dresses as a he and falls in love with another he who sends her to another she who loves the she who’s dressed as a he. Did you follow that? Don’t worry. Later, up pops another he who’s identical to the first she and they all get married. The audience

Giannandrea Poesio

Ruffled feathers

The Royal Ballet could not have timed better its new run of Swan Lake. Swans — and black ones, in particular — are all the rage these days. The Royal Ballet could not have timed better its new run of Swan Lake. Swans — and black ones, in particular — are all the rage these days. Unsurprisingly, the first performance played to a packed house, although the sell-out could not be entirely credited to the swan-o-mania prompted by Aronofsky’s movie Black Swan. Sarah Lamb starred in the demanding double role that the ballet is famous for and which the film focuses on. Not unlike the character portrayed by Natalie Portman,

James Delingpole

Wasted talent

‘We’ve got our main presenters,’ they explained. ‘What we need are interviewees to fill the guest slots. People with strong opinions on …well, what are your views on the EU, for example?’ So I told them my views on the EUSSR, while swearing quite a lot. This seemed to make them happy. ‘It’s called 10 O’Clock Live,’ they said. ‘You probably saw our pilot. The one-off special with Lauren Laverne, Charlie Brooker, David Mitchell and Jimmy Carr? It got pretty good ratings.’ No, I replied. That isn’t the sort of programme I’d watch in a million years. Lefty comedians making lefty jokes to a lefty audience about politics from a

Kate Chisholm

Born of a fury

As the battle rages between the American and British military PR over which brigade is being the most effective force for change in Afghanistan, it’s easy to forget that this proud country has its own ideas about what it needs in the future. As the battle rages between the American and British military PR over which brigade is being the most effective force for change in Afghanistan, it’s easy to forget that this proud country has its own ideas about what it needs in the future. In Lost Voices of Afghanistan (Radio 4, late on Saturday evening) we heard from those whose thoughts have long been buried beneath the cruelty,

Ursula Buchan

Our avian friends

Several new facts have rocked me back on my heels recently: Alastair Cook garnered more runs at the Gabba in Brisbane than Don Bradman; there are 100,000 miles of blood vessels in your brain; more people in this country can recognise Simon Cowell than Pope Benedict; and we spend as much annually on ‘wild bird care’ — £200 million — as we do on peat and potting composts, and rather more than on fertilisers. Several new facts have rocked me back on my heels recently: Alastair Cook garnered more runs at the Gabba in Brisbane than Don Bradman; there are 100,000 miles of blood vessels in your brain; more people

Saturday

Niru Ratnam

Creative protesting

It’s time to heed the complaints and free art schools from the constraints of the university system, says Niru Ratnam The Turner Prize award ceremony always attracts protest — usually in the shape of the Stuckists, a group of bedraggled, eccentric-looking artists who gather outside Tate Britain in funny hats and bemoan the death of representational painting. But this year they were upstaged by around 200 art students, who entered the museum in the afternoon and refused to leave, staging what was described as a ‘teach-in’. In addition to wearing their own humorous hats, the students made speeches, marched round and chanted. The ‘teach-in’ was a protest against proposals unveiled

Ed Rex

Reinventing the circus

An elderly gentleman prodding me in the face with his inflatable iguana might expect to command my full attention. As I found my seat in the Albert Hall, though, the gentleman in question had to turn away disheartened, as I was too busy taking in the spectacular set of Cirque du Soleil’s Totem to be distracted by his intrusive pet. An elderly gentleman prodding me in the face with his inflatable iguana might expect to command my full attention. As I found my seat in the Albert Hall, though, the gentleman in question had to turn away disheartened, as I was too busy taking in the spectacular set of Cirque