Culture

Culture

The good, the bad and the ugly in books, exhibitions, cinema, TV, dance, music, podcasts and theatre.

Paddington – The Musical is sensational

Theatre

Who doesn’t love Paddington? The winsome marmalade junkie has arrived at the Savoy Theatre in a musical version of the 2014 movie. First of all, the show is sensational. Absolute box-office gold, full of joy, mirth and spectacle. It’s also quite pricey but never mind. Sceptics who feel indifferent to children’s fiction will be relieved

Ivo van Hove tries and fails to destroy Arthur Miller

Theatre

All My Sons, set in an American suburb in the summer of 1947, examines the downfall of Joe Keller, a wealthy and patriotic arms manufacturer. During the war he was falsely accused of selling wonky parts to the US military which caused the deaths of 21 airmen. He blamed his partner for the blunder but

The wit of Tom Stoppard

Theatre

The playwright Peter Nichols created a character based on Tom Stoppard. Miles Whittier. On a car journey across London, I once asked Peter why he was so irked by Stoppard. Thelma, his wife, answered for him: ‘He uses all the oxygen.’ But Stoppard was miles wittier. Asked by a punter, after the New York first

A sack of bilge: End, at the Dorfman Theatre, reviewed

Theatre

End is the title chosen by David Eldridge for his new relationship drama. Clive Owen and Saskia Reeves star as Alfie and Julie, a pair of wildly successful creative types who live in a mansion near Highgate. Both are 59. Alfie is a retired DJ who made a fortune touring the world at the height

The babyishness of Hunger Games on Stage

Theatre

The Hunger Games is based on a 2008 novel  about a despotic regime where brainwashed citizens are entertained with televised duels between teenagers. Not a bad idea. We go behind the scenes and watch Katniss (Mia Carragher) being selected to fight Peeta (Euan Garrett) who secretly adores her. As soon as the plot starts, it

This Othello is almost flawless

Theatre

Othello directed by Tom Morris opens with a stately display of scarlet costumes and gilded doorways arranged against a backdrop of black nothingness. This is Venice at night with no hint of sea or sunshine. Crimson-robed senators gather to discuss Othello’s alleged abduction of Brabantio’s daughter. And here he comes, David Harewood as the Moor,

One of the best plays about the 1980s ever staged

Theatre

Alan Hollinghurst’s The Line of Beauty has been turned into a stage show directed by Michael Grandage. We’re in the early 1980s and Nick has just left Oxford with a literature degree. He lodges with his wealthy friend, Toby Fedden, in their family home and he offers to keep an eye on Toby’s troubled sister,

Perfection: Hampstead Theatre's The Assembled Parties reviewed

Theatre

The Assembled Parties, by Richard Greenberg, is a rich, warm family comedy that received three Tony nominations in 2013 following its New York première. Hampstead has taken a slight risk with this revival. The cryptic title doesn’t suggest an easygoing drama full of excellent jokes. The Yiddish slang may be unfamiliar to English ears, and

Why was the 19th century so full of bigots and weirdos? 

Theatre

Da Vinci’s Laundry is based on an art world rumour. In 2017, Leonardo’s ‘Salvator Mundi’ sold at Christie’s for $450 million but some experts claimed that the attribution was inaccurate. Could the world’s costliest artwork be a fake? Writer, Keelan Kember, considers the provenance of a fictional Leonardo owned by a thuggish oligarch, Boris, who

Tracy Letts's magic touch

Theatre

Tracy Letts’s Mary Page Marlowe is a biographical portrait of an emotionally damaged mother struggling with romantic and family problems. Susan Sarandon shares the lead with four other actresses which makes the show a little hard to follow. And the timeline is jumbled up so that the audience has to find its bearings at the

Stephen Fry is the perfect Lady Bracknell

Theatre

Hamlet at the National opens like a John Lewis Christmas advert. Elegant celebrations are in progress. The stage is full of dining tables draped in white linen and adorned with flowers and beautiful glassware sparkling in the candlelight. Elsinore is reimagined as the home of a multicultural royal family. Claudius, resplendent in a dark dinner

A dazzling musical celebration of the 1970s

Theatre

Clarkston is an American-backed production featuring a Netflix star, Joe Locke. He plays a young graduate with a terminal illness, Jake, who works at a Costco warehouse in a failing midwest town. Jake is a brainbox with an IQ of 140 who takes a scholarly interest in early American history. On his first day at

When Freud met Hitler

Theatre

A new play by Lawrence Marks and Maurice Gran, the writers of Birds of a Feather, feels like a major event. This is a period drama that examines an imaginary association between Hitler and Freud and develops into an enquiry about the nature of evil. As Hitler grows into adulthood he gravitates towards the Freud

Mercifully short: Interview at Riverside Studios reviewed

Theatre

Interview is a blind-date play. Only it’s not a blind date but a showbiz interview for a journal called the New York Chronicle. The characters (played by Robert Sean Leonard and Paten Hughes) bicker, flirt and get emotionally involved during a 90-minute conversation. Naturally it all starts badly. The interviewer, Pierre, arrives at Katya’s Brooklyn

The time Spike Milligan tried to kill me

Theatre

The theatre impresario Michael White rang me one day in 1964, and said he was presenting a play at the Lyric Hammersmith, where there was a small role he thought might suit me. The play was an adaptation of the novel Oblomov by Ivan Goncharov, where the eponymous hero spends most of his life in

An English Chekhov: The Gathered Leaves at Park200 reviewed

Theatre

Chekhov with an English accent. That’s how Andrew Keatley’s play, The Gathered Leaves, begins. The setting is a country house where a family of recusant English Catholics meet for a weekend of surprises and high drama. The audience was on its feet, cheering and clapping, some of them in tears At first, the main conflict

Glorious: Good Night, Oscar, at the Barbican, reviewed

Theatre

Good Night, Oscar is a biographical play about Oscar Levant, a famous pianist who was also a noted wit and raconteur. The script starts as a dead-safe comedy and it develops into a gripping battle between the forces of anarchy, represented by Oscar, and the controllers of NBC who want to censor his crazy humour.

The problem with psychiatrists? They're all depressed

Theatre

Edinburgh seems underpopulated this year. The whisky bars are half full and the throngs of tourists who usually crowd the roadways haven’t materialised. There’s a sharp chill in the air too. Anoraks and hats are worn all day, and anyone eating outdoors in the evening is dressed for base camp. Perhaps tourists don’t want to

What a slippery, hateful toad Fred Goodwin was

Theatre

Make It Happen is a portrait of a bullying control freak, Fred Goodwin, who turned RBS into the largest bank in the world until it came crashing down in 2008. Fred the Shred’s character makes him a tough subject for a drama. His morning meetings were called ‘morning beatings’ by terrified staff. He ordered executives

Wonderfully corny: Burlesque, at the Savoy, reviewed

Theatre

Inter Alia, a new play from the creators of Prima Facie, follows the hectic double life of Jess, a crown court judge, played by Rosamund Pike. As a high-flying lawyer with a family to care for, she knows that ‘having it all’ means ‘doing it all’. When not in court, she skivvies non-stop for her

The National have bungled their Rishi Sunak satire

Theatre

The Estate begins with a typical NHS story. An elderly Sikh arrives in A&E after a six-hour wait for an ambulance and he’s asked to collect his own vomit in an NHS bucket. The doctors tell him he’s fine and sends him home where he promptly dies. His only son, Angad, inherits all his property,

More drama-school showcase than epic human tragedy: Evita reviewed

Theatre

Evita, directed by Jamie Lloyd, is a catwalk version of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical. The actors perform on the steps of a football stadium where they race through an effortful series of dance routines accompanied by flashy lights and thumping tunes. It’s more a drama-school showcase than an epic human tragedy. There are no

Superb: Stereophonic, at Duke of York's Theatre, reviewed

Theatre

Stereophonic is a slow-burning drama set in an American recording studio in 1976. A collection of hugely successful musicians, loosely based on Fleetwood Mac, are working on a new album which they hope will match the success of their previous number one smash. This is an absolute treat for anyone who appreciates subtle, oblique and