Alexander Larman is an author and the US books editor of The Spectator.
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Steven Spielberg might be the most beloved and popular American director of the 20th century, but it is also unavoidably the case that, since 2005’s Munich, he has been on something of a disappointing run. While many of his films, not least The Fabelmans and West Side Story, have been critically acclaimed and Oscar-nominated, there
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Amid the many disappointments and commercial flops the music industry saw this year, perhaps the most egregious was the complete failure of Arcade Fire’s album Pink Elephant. The failure represents not merely the probable end of the band, but also the death of Obama-era rock. Pink Elephant received dismal reviews and didn’t even chart on the Billboard
Anyone who has had the misfortune to be in central London at rush hour will be familiar with an unlovely spectacle: that of a middle-aged man solemnly making a fool out of himself on an ungainly-looking bicycle that seems slightly too small for him. This mode of transportation is none other than the Brompton bicycle,
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Remember him for his great works, not his horrific end
The news that King Charles’s cancer treatment will be moving into a new phase as of next year is undeniably welcome, both for him on a personal level and for those who have been anxiously wishing him well since his diagnosis in January 2024. He offered the nation an update on his situation last night
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Give him no second chances
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Hollywood might be in trouble, but the director isn’t
With the average cost of a hotel room in London costing around £250 a night – and not showing any signs of getting lower, either – most might think that a stay in the capital is a rarefied activity. However, the news that the Zedwell group of budget-conscious hotels have opened a mega-budget establishment in
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The sale would create a monopoly the likes of which has never been seen before in the film industry
For lovers of self-destructive hubris – a quality that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex surely possess in spades – the saga of Prince Harry’s security is surely the gift that keeps on giving. Not since Jeremy Thorpe ensured that his former lover Norman Scott was deprived of his National Insurance card has anyone publicly
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His solo trip to the UK in September demonstrated that he’s capable of conducting a quasi-royal visit by himself
If you’ve ever dramatically broken up with an ex, only to find, to your miserable disbelief, that they keep popping up in the most inconvenient circumstances, you may feel a degree of sympathy with the royals as regards Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. A few weeks after he was stripped of his titles and ordered to leave Royal
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We should hope so
Describing the royal family as ‘funny’ is not, perhaps, the first thing that comes to mind when talking about the Windsors. After all, anyone with a long memory remembers the horrors of It’s A Royal Knockout in 1987. Meanwhile, the performers who tend to get the biggest laughs from them at the Royal Variety Show are
On the Live Aid charity single, ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas’, Bono sings the (somewhat incongruous) line ‘Well tonight, thank God it’s them instead of you’. Although he is referring to starving children dying in poverty rather than well-heeled Americans appearing on television, much the same sentiment applies to the unfortunate ‘special guests’ who have
If you’re fortunate enough to have been well-lunched at an establishment like the Ritz or 5 Hertford Street, your host may ask if you fancy a cigar. You would be forgiven for declining the opportunity to step out into the December chill. Say as much and a proud gleam may then enter your host’s eyes
As Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor contemplates the wreckage of his public life and career, it would be easy to say that his disgrace is complete. In fact, there is a qualifier: his disgrace is almost complete. Despite no longer being a royal prince, the Duke of York or holder of the Order of the Garter, Andrew still
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The fifth season is full of self-referential excess, but it’s also an example of great homage
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Anthology 4 makes the extraordinary band seem ordinary
The vast acclaim that Sir Philip Pullman’s latest novel, The Rose Field, has received has cemented his status as one of Britain’s most successful writers. Such authors are listened to, whatever their concerns, and so it has been both unsurprising and depressing that Sir Philip has been bothered not about literary matters, but about his
