Jane Got A Gun review: Natalie Portman struggles to save a messy film April 21, 2016 The Western, that great American genre, hasn’t treated the fairer sex very… well, fairly. Their role is usually confined to prostitutes or prizes to be won in a shoot out. Jane Got a Gun wants to be something more. It started life with Lynne Ramsay, the Scottish director behind outstanding adaptations of We Need to [...]
Funny Girl review: Sheridan Smith is show-stoppingly hilarious in this hit comedy musical April 21, 2016 If there were any lingering concerns about Sheridan Smith’s ability to fill the Streisand-sized boots of Fanny Brice in Funny Girl, they’re almost immediately dashed the moment she takes to the stage. They’re dashed and then dashed again, and then any remaining shreds of undashed concern are swept up in a little basket and hurled [...]
The Flick play comes to London’s Dorfman Theatre and it’s brilliant April 21, 2016 A man stands under harsh fluorescent strip-lights, slowly – painfully slowly – mopping the floor. We watch for what seems like hours as he squeezes out his mop, slides it dully across the ground and repeats, interminably. There's no wink towards the audience, no suggestion that some comic reward is about to follow. It never does. The Flick, [...]
The Suicide at The National Theatre is a chaotic disappointment April 15, 2016 Lyttelton Theatre | ★★☆☆☆ This update of a Stalin-era Russian satire veers between chaotic hilarity and ill-judged mean-spiritedness, reaches occasional soaring highs only to plumb depths the likes of which are rarely seen at the National Theatre. Over the two and a half hour run time, the enjoyable moments are far outweighed by the relentless procession [...]
She Said review: Dancer Tamara Rojo presents three powerful and engrossing ballets rolled into one stunning performance April 14, 2016 Sadler's Wells | ★★★★★ Tamara Rojo, lead principal dancer and artistic director of the English National Ballet, says in over 20 years of dancing she’s never been in a ballet made by a woman. Here, she sets about redressing the balance, presenting three roughly hour-long, self-contained ballets, all choreographed by women. Thankfully, all three are [...]
The Jungle Book review: An all-star revival of a family classic with a monkey so unfathomably large it will blow your mind April 14, 2016 Dir. Jon Favreau | ★★★★☆ Think about the biggest monkey you’ve ever seen. Now double it. Now make it seven feet taller. Now triple it. Hold on, slow down, are you mad? That monkey’s much too big. But dial it down just a notch or two and you’ll be picturing an ape on par with [...]
Boy at the Almeida review: a flawed portrait of listlessness and poverty April 14, 2016 Almeida | ★★★☆☆ Boy takes place on a winding conveyor belt, with actors and props spinning before the audience like dishes at an especially dour branch of Yo Sushi. What starts out as a sexual health clinic becomes a bus stop then a housing estate then a park then a street outside a nightclub. Often [...]
Tate Britain’s Conceptual Art in Britain 1964-1979 is worthwhile if you’re prepared to work for it April 14, 2016 Tate Britain | ★★★☆☆ When you enter this exhibition, you’ll see a pyramid of oranges stacked up in front of you, giving the gallery a pleasant citrusy aroma. Go over and pick one up – this is allowed – and hold it in your hand for the rest of the time you’re there. You’ll want to [...]
Tate Modern unveils its plans for a brave new art world but admits it still has £30m financial black hole April 14, 2016 A group of more than 500 singers will greet the first visitors to the new Tate Modern gallery when it opens in June, underlining its new focus on live and performance art. Following that visitors can look forward to being corralled by horseback police in the Turbine Hall courtesy of Tania Bruguera's Tatlin's Whisper, as well as experiencing experimental sculpture from Tokyo, social [...]