Heading to the Olympics? This pop-up member’s club is a British haven amid Rio’s frantic last-minute preparations July 15, 2016 The London 2012 Olympics saw an influx of well-heeled socialites arriving in the capital looking for a place to party. It’s not just Usain Bolt and Jessica Ennis-Hill who soak up the Olympic limelight: the greatest show on earth is an excuse to see and be seen, to flash the cash and ogle the beautiful [...]
Glasgow’s Dakota Deluxe hotel review: a Hollister-hip new venture from the kingpin of Scottish hotels July 15, 2016 Steve Dinneen takes a break in his former hometown of Glasgow, where he finds a much improved hotel scene and restaurants that are as good as ever. The weekend: For many southerners, a weekend break to Scotland involves a trip to Edinburgh Castle or a few rounds at Gleneagles. And while these are both perfectly [...]
Keanu film review: a clever pastiche of action films and urban culture starring TV duo Key and Peele July 14, 2016 How far would you go to save a cat? That's the question asked by this new action-comedy from TV duo Key and Peele, the cousins forced to become gangsters by a nefarious drug dealer (Method Man) in order to get their beloved kitten Keanu back. The stars have a terrific natural rapport, morphing seamlessly from [...]
This ex-army man’s new company is driving cowboy builders out of London with its focus on military precision July 14, 2016 We all love to moan about tradesmen – often with good reason. The famously flaky building industry means the cliches about people not turning up, or leaving a job half finished, are sadly too often still true. And consumers compound the problem by taking the lowest quote for a job. It was this apparent absence [...]
How British designers like Burberry, Paul Smith and Alexander McQueen influenced the design of stunning flats at One Tower Bridge July 14, 2016 July sunshine and the smell of newly mown grass hit me as I stepped out of the latest show apartment at One Tower Bridge on Monday morning. How evocative of a British summer at its best. Built by Squire and Partners for Berkeley Homes, it is this, the development’s iconic location on the south bank [...]
Ghostbusters at the Imax, The Lambeth Country Show and the world’s first VR play: 11 things to do in London this weekend July 14, 2016 1. Go to Barbican to see Ragnar Kjartansson Art, Barbican Centre, 10.00-17.30, £12 A self-aware, light-hearted, occasionally laugh-out-loud funny show, and a rare chance to enjoy a master of performance art whose work has never before been collected in the UK. 2. And while you’re there, book tickets to see Needles and Opium Theatre, Barbican [...]
Ghostbusters review: Just how important is a penis when it comes to running a successful ghost busting enterprise? July 14, 2016 How can a woman bust a ghost when her dumb boobs would just get in the way? This philosophical quandary is just one of the many posed by the terrible crowd of awful men who live on the internet and split their time evenly between shouting at imaginary women and angrily squirming around on the [...]
Ctrl at RADA Studios by Breaking Fourth is the world’s first VR play, and we can’t get enough of it July 14, 2016 This debut feature from Breaking Fourth claims to be the first Virtual Reality play, combining elements of video game storytelling with both traditional and immersive theatre. In this case, the “theatre” is a dark room filled with swivel chairs, where you’re given a short, in-character introduction before being told to don your VR headset (Samsung [...]
Cut is a psychological thriller half set in complete darkness July 14, 2016 A one-woman art performance in which a stunned audience is subjected to the traumatic inner brain-wrongs of a rapidly unravelling, paranoid air hostess, Cut is part psychological thriller and part first-person exploration of violent schizophrenic horror. In the tiny Vaults Theatre beneath the rail arches of Waterloo station, viewers are repeatedly plunged into complete darkness [...]
The Stripper play at St James Theatre review: Richard O’Brien’s follow-up to The Rocky Horror Picture Show gets stuck in a sexist time warp July 13, 2016 This 1980 musical by Rocky Horror writer Richard O’Brien – itself an adaptation of Carter Brown’s pulpy 1959 short story – fails at any point to justify its revival. O’Brien’s hero is Al Wheeler (Sebastien Torkia), a California cop who fails to save the suicidal Patty Keller (Gloria Onitri) from a window ledge drop. “Did [...]