theartsdesk com, first with arts reviews, news and interviews
Tom Birchenough
Friday, 14 November 2025
We are bowled over! We knew that theartsdesk.com had plenty of supporters out there – we’ve always had a loyal readership of arts lovers and professionals alike – but the...
Boyd Tonkin
Wednesday, 18 June 2025
This year’s Aldeburgh Festival – the 76th – takes as its motto a line from Shelley‘s Prometheus Unbound. The poet speaks of despair “Mingled with love and then dissolved in sound...
Miranda Heggie
Wednesday, 18 June 2025
"When I was your age, I worked in a corrugated cardboard factory!" is a phrase my father was fond of telling me as a teenager, presumably in an attempt to extol the virtues of a...
David Nice
Tuesday, 17 June 2025
It amuses me that Dubliners dress up in Edwardian finery on 16 June. After all, this was the date in 1904 when James Joyce first walked out with Nora Barnacle and, putting her...
Helen Hawkins
Tuesday, 17 June 2025
The tag “the most Tony-nominated play of all time” may mean less to London theatregoers than it does to New Yorkers, but Stereophonic, newly arrived at the Duke of York’s,...
Sarah Kent
Tuesday, 17 June 2025
Tate Britain is currently offering two exhibitions for the price of one. Other than being on the same bill, Edward Burra and Ithell Colquhoun having nothing in common other than...
Veronica Lee
Tuesday, 17 June 2025
Death can be a powerful driver for comedy, as countless stand-ups and sitcom writers will affirm, but it has to be...
Demetrios Matheou
Tuesday, 17 June 2025
A look at Darling on its 60th anniversary offers a sobering reality check on the "Swinging Sixties", a...
Nick Hasted
Monday, 16 June 2025
Jarvis Cocker is proudly holding the No 1 trophy handed to him on the day Pulp topped the album chart for the first time in...
Stephen Walsh
Monday, 16 June 2025
Tchaikovsky has precisely two operas in the standard repertoire (including The Queen of Spades, currently playing at...
Jonathan Geddes
Monday, 16 June 2025
Had a passer-by from outwith Newcastle been asked to guess what was taking place at St James' Park, football would have been...
Robert Beale
Monday, 16 June 2025
The opening and closing concerts of a season tend to be statements of intent – to pursue a path of exploration or (latterly...
Gary Naylor
Monday, 16 June 2025
Older readers may recall the cobbled together, ramshackle play, a staple of the Golden Age of Light Entertainment that would...
Joe Muggs
Monday, 16 June 2025
One of the great untold stories of the past decade is just how potent a cultural force R&B has been. It might not have...
Kieron Tyler
Sunday, 15 June 2025
"It was really strange. Really quite conflicting, the sort of thing most bands didn't have to deal with. At the front, we'd...
Justine Elias
Saturday, 14 June 2025
The opening images of Tornado are striking. A wild-haired young woman in Japanese peasant garb runs for her life through a...
Gary Naylor
Saturday, 14 June 2025
The safe transfer of power in post-war Western democracies was once a given. The homely Pickfords Removals van outside...
Graham Fuller
Saturday, 14 June 2025
On leaving prison, Lollipop’s thirtyish single mum Molly discovers that reclaiming her kids from social care is akin to...
Sarah Kent
Saturday, 14 June 2025
I first came across Rachel Jones in 2021 at the Hayward Gallery’s painting show Mixing it Up: Painting Today. I was blown...
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disc of the day
Blu-ray: Darling
John Schlesinger's Sixties classic now feels problematic, but retains an icky fascination
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Subscribe to theartsdesk.com
Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
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tv
The Gold, Series 2, BBC One review - back on the trail of the Brink's-Mat bandits
Following the money to the Isle of Man, Spain and the Caribbean
Dept. Q, Netflix review - Danish crime thriller finds a new home in Edinburgh
Matthew Goode stars as antisocial detective Carl Morck
The Rise and Fall of Michelle Mone, BBC Two - boom and bust in the lingerie trade
Life in the fast lane with David Cameron's entrepreneurship tsar
film
Blu-ray: Darling
John Schlesinger's Sixties classic now feels problematic, but retains an icky fascination
Tornado review - samurai swordswoman takes Scotland by storm
East meets West meets North of the Border in a wintry 18th-century actioner
Lollipop review - a family torn apart
Posy Sterling brilliantly conveys the torment of a homeless single mother denied her kids
new music
Hidden Door Festival 2025 review - the transformative Edinburgh event's most site-specific festival yet
Art and machinery align in former paper factory
Pulp, O2 Arena review - common people like us
Jarvis Cocker's mature muse proves ready to follow fans through their lives
Sam Fender, St James' Park, Newcastle review - Geordie Springsteen scores with celebratory homecoming
The singer's set was a passionate, emotional display of rock music
classical
Aldeburgh Festival, Weekend 1 review - dance to the music of time
From Chekhovian opera to supernatural ballads, past passions return to life by the sea
Dandy, BBC Philharmonic, Storgårds, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - a destination attained
A powerful experience endorses Storgårds’ continued relationship with the orchestra
Hespèrion XXI, Savall, QEH review - an evening filled with laughter and light
An exhilarating exploration of innovation in 16th and 17th century repertoire
opera
Mazeppa, Grange Park Opera review - a gripping reassessment
Unbalanced drama with a powerful core, uninhibitedly staged
Saul, Glyndebourne review - playful, visually ravishing descent into darkness
Ten years after it first opened Barrie Kosky's production still packs a hefty punch
Così fan tutte, Nevill Holt Festival/Opera North review - re-writing the script
Real feeling turns the tables on stage artifice in Mozart that charms, and moves
theatre
Joyceana around Bloomsday, Dublin review - flawless adaptations of great dramatic writing
Chapters and scenes from 'Ulysses', 'Dubliners' and a children’s story vividly done
Stereophonic, Duke of York's Theatre review - rich slice of creative life delivered by a 1970s rock band
David Adjmi's clever and compelling hit play gets a crack London cast
North by Northwest, Alexandra Palace review - Hitchcock adaptation fails to fly
Emma Rice's storytelling at fault in misconceived production
dance
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Ballet to Broadway: Wheeldon Works, Royal Ballet review - the impressive range and reach of Christopher Wheeldon's craft
The title says it: as dancemaker, as creative magnet, the man clearly works his socks off
The Forsythe Programme, English National Ballet review - brains, beauty and bravura
Once again the veteran choreographer and maverick William Forsythe raises ENB's game
comedy
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Sarah Silverman, Netflix Special review - finding the funny in losing a parent
Affectionate memorial to her dad
Dara Ó Briain, Soho Theatre Walthamstow review - master storyteller spins a family yarn
Search for his birth father takes a few turns
Books
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Samuel Arbesman: The Magic of Code review - the spark ages
A wide-eyed take on our digital world can’t quite dispel the dangers
Zsuzsanna Gahse: Mountainish review - seeking refuge
Notes on danger and dialogue in the shadow of the Swiss Alps
visual arts
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages of love and support
Much-appreciated words of commendation from readers and the cultural community
Ithell Colquhoun, Tate Britain review - revelations of a weird and wonderful world
Emanations from the unconscious
Rachel Jones: Gated Canyons, Dulwich Picture Gallery review - teeth with a real bite
Mouths have never looked so good
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