childhood
Listed: Precocious WritersSaturday, 18 July 2015
Once upon a time... Storytelling is an integral part of all human cultures, and a central pillar of an enlightened education. Some children get the hang of it quickly – they are, as the phrase has it, natural storytellers. This week the Royal Court... Read more... |
The WondersWednesday, 15 July 2015
Somewhere in rural Italy around the border of Umbria-Lazio and Tuscany, a family is trying to make the best of trying circumstances. Their mainstay is the production of honey. They have sheep. There are blackberries on their land. But money is short... Read more... |
The House of Mirrors & Hearts, ArcolaThursday, 09 July 2015
Musicals are cheesy by nature, aren’t they? If not cheesy, then picturesque. The cast of Les Mis may be grimy and poor, but they’re picture-postcard poor. Even modern musicals play by the rules.But Aemonn O’Dwyer and Rob Gilbert break most of them... Read more... |
P'tit QuinquinThursday, 09 July 2015
When least expected, comedy has come stumbling into the work of French auteur Bruno Dumont. In his seven films to date, from the Cannes-winning Humanité of 1999 through to the stark Camille Claudel 1915 from two years ago, the director, frequently... Read more... |
Peter Pan, Welsh National OperaSunday, 17 May 2015
I must have been one of the few in Saturday’s audience for Richard Ayres’s new opera who had never seen Barrie’s play or read the book, so I’m unable to judge how faithfully it renders the original – in case that matters. Somehow one knows the... Read more... |
The Twits, Royal Court TheatreWednesday, 15 April 2015
The Royal Court has had a makeover. Recently, the walls have had a fresh coat of paint and huge messages have appeared on them: the front doors now say, “Come In”. (Oh, thanks for telling me...) Inside, there are so many arrows pointing you to the... Read more... |
DVD: BoyhoodTuesday, 27 January 2015
Boyhood is an intimate film on an epic scale. Twelve years zoom past in 189 minutes, as we follow Mason Evans Jr.'s journey from primary school pupil to university student. That the film exists at all seems miraculous; you admire the producers’... Read more... |
The Railway Children, King's Cross TheatreSaturday, 17 January 2015
Disillusioned with our modern world? Why not journey back into an idyllic past, when trains were benign, anthropomorphic creatures rather than sources of commuter angst, red petticoats held life-saving powers, and it was perfectly all right for... Read more... |
Ceremony of Innocence/The Age of Anxiety/Aeternum, Royal BalletSaturday, 08 November 2014
English National Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet have staged programmes of war pieces already this year; now here's the Royal Ballet bringing up the rear in its own inimitable (and rather oblique) fashion with a triple bill that picks up on and... Read more... |
Lord of the Flies, Matthew Bourne's New Adventures, Sadler's WellsFriday, 10 October 2014
New Adventures, the name of Matthew Bourne's company, has a ruddy-cheeked, Boys’ Own ring to it that has – until now – been rather belied by his oeuvre, which includes a dance version of Edward Scissorhands, as well as dark retellings of all the... Read more... |
DVD: The ChangesFriday, 15 August 2014
Fantastic is the only word for The Changes. Fantastic as in fantasy, and fantastic because it's a television drama that's brilliantly conceived and impeccably executed – and also because it tackles issues of social cohesion and fragmentation head-on... Read more... |
DVD: Swallows & AmazonsTuesday, 05 August 2014
“We were making a film about the ideal summer holiday,” says actor Sophie Neville in one of the extras on this "40th Anniversary Special Edition" of the 1974 adaptation of Arthur Ransome's book Swallows & Amazons. As Titty Walker, she played a... Read more... |
