Big Kid Circus has been stranded overlooking the beach and promenade at the Lancashire resort since lockdown began
Continue reading...Category Archives: Culture
Athens hotel ordered to demolish top floors blocking Acropolis view
Campaigners ‘overjoyed’ at landmark ruling but say review of planning laws still needed
A battle over the right to enjoy uninterrupted views of the Acropolis has resulted in a five-star hotel being ordered to demolish its top two floors, in a landmark ruling hailed by residents of Athens.
Owned by Coco-Mat, the Greece-based mattress maker, the hotel — whose “breathtaking terrace” had been its selling point — opened its doors barely a year ago. Citizens enraged about the ten-storey establishment blocking their own views of the citadel took the case to the highest court in the land.
Continue reading...Betty Wright, US soul, funk and R&B singer, dies aged 66
Singer with remarkable vocal range had been sampled by generations of hip-hop and R&B artists, including Beyoncé and Mary J Blige
The soul, funk and R&B singer Betty Wright, celebrated across pop genres for her remarkable vocal prowess, has died aged 66.
The cause of death was not immediately known but Wright’s niece confirmed the news, writing on Twitter: “Sleep in peace aunty Betty Wright. Fly high angel.”
Continue reading...Conservation society clashes with Disney over missing historic letters
Campaigners call for return of 1930s wording to Twentieth Century Fox Film Co former offices
Disney, titan of the media and entertainment world, has enraged a group of Londoners attempting to preserve one of Soho’s best-known squares. And the battle is over one word: “Fox”.
In the south-west corner of Soho Square stands Twentieth Century House, a grand emblem of the American film industry’s key role in this part of the city since 1937. It is now in the hands of Disney.
Continue reading...Little Richard, rock’n’roll pioneer, dies aged 87
His 1955 song Tutti Frutti, with the lyric ‘awopbopaloobop alopbamboom’, and a series of follow-up records helped establish the genre and influence a multitude of other musicians
Little Richard, one of the pioneers of the first wave of rock’n’roll, has died. He was 87.
Related: Little Richard – a life in pictures
Continue reading...Could a 12-year-old Australian-Chinese violinist be the next child prodigy?
Decca Classics’ youngest-ever signing, Christian Li, has been hailed a ‘superstar’ who is already up there with the greats
The classical music world is no stranger to young talent. The 19th century virtuoso Niccolò Paganini started playing aged seven, while Yehudi Menuhin caused a sensation with his performance, at the same age, of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto.
Now, however, there’s a new kid on the block, whose backers say transforms from “normal child” to “absolute superstar” the moment the lights dim. Christian Li, a 12-year-old schoolboy violinist from Melbourne, recently became the youngest-ever artist signed by the Decca Classics record label. He will release a new recording later this month, a contemporary adaptation of a traditional Chinese folk tune.
Continue reading...‘Colour allows us to understand in a deeper sense’: Hitler, Churchill and others in a new light
The story of global conflict is all the more powerful when it isn’t seen in black and white. Artist Marina Amaral explains her latest work
On a stretcher lies a patient; his ashen face protrudes from under a green blanket, eyes closed. Two uniformed women carry the stretcher, wearing face masks. It looks as if it’s a lovely day: the sun is shining, the shadows dark, the sky blue. But this is not a happy picture. Is the casualty even alive, or has he already been taken by the killer virus that has wrapped itself around our planet like a python, squeezing the life from it?
The photograph was taken at an ambulance station in Washington DC. Within the past couple of months? It could have been, if it weren’t for the uniforms (I don’t think today’s nurses wear lace-up leather boots) and the stretcher. In fact, it was taken more than a century ago, in 1918, during the Spanish flu epidemic, which killed so many millions. The photographer is unknown, forgotten. But the black and white picture was recently “colourised” by Marina Amaral.
Continue reading...Bob Dylan announces first original album in eight years, Rough and Rowdy Ways
Album news revealed with release of third song from the project, swaggering blues number False Prophet
Bob Dylan has announced his first album of original songwriting in eight years.
Rough and Rowdy Ways will be released on 19 June. It follows three albums of cover versions – Shadows in the Night (2015), Fallen Angels (2016) and triple album Triplicate (2017) – with his previous album of his own songs, Tempest, released in 2012.
Continue reading...Brian May taken to hospital after tearing buttock muscles while gardening
Queen guitarist says ‘I won’t be able to walk for a while’ after injury during lockdown and lambasts Boris Johnson over coronavirus
Brian May has complained of “relentless pain” after he was taken to hospital following a gardening injury that tore muscles in his buttocks – and, while in recovery, made a sustained attack on Boris Johnson’s preparedness for coronavirus.
Writing on Instagram, the Queen guitarist said: “I managed to rip my gluteus maximus to shreds in a moment of overenthusiastic gardening. So suddenly I find myself in a hospital getting scanned to find out exactly how much I’ve actually damaged myself. Turns out I did a thorough job – this is a couple of days ago – and I won’t be able to walk for a while … or sleep, without a lot of assistance, because the pain is relentless.”
Continue reading...Berlin’s battle scars remain 75 years after end of WWII – in pictures
8 May marks the 75th anniversary of the end of the second world war in Europe. Parts of the destruction that resulted from the fight for Berlin are still visible decades later
Continue reading...Julie Andrews: ‘I was certainly aware of tales about the casting couch’
The celebrated actor had a turbulent upbringing before becoming world-famous for playing two perfect nannies. Now she’s bonding with a new generation of children through her storytelling podcast
“I’ll tell you what, shall I go outside?” Julie Andrews asks. We are talking by phone, but, alas, the reception inside her home on Long Island is, she says, “always terrible”. Torturous minutes pass in which I can hear only fragments of her conversation, and if anyone knows of a sweeter agony than being barely able to hear Andrews’ still lovely, melodious voice, I don’t want to know what it is. Eventually, I have to tell her this phone conversation isn’t working.
“I can stand out in my garden, although it is a bit nippy …” Andrews suggests.
Continue reading...Florian Schneider, Kraftwerk co-founder, dies aged 73
Co-founder of hugely influential electronic pop group, who has died of cancer, had a UK No 1 hit with The Model in 1982
Florian Schneider, who as one of the founding members of German group Kraftwerk changed the sound of pop music forever, has died aged 73 of cancer.
The news was confirmed to the Guardian by one of his musical collaborators, who said Schneider had died a week ago and had a private burial. It was also confirmed via Sony Berlin.
Continue reading...‘It’s a tough island to live on’: why coronavirus spells doom for Ibiza
Clubs on the White Isle are starting to cancel their events, a disaster for workers who survive on summer income. Pete Tong and others explain what happens next
• Coronavirus and culture – a list of major cancellations
Ibiza welcomes more than three million visitors during the summer months, pumping billions into its economy. Close to 75% of the island’s 147,000-plus population get their income from tourism, directly and indirectly – besides the fabled nightclub scene, there’s the hotels, Airbnbs, restaurants, bars, shops, taxis, and other businesses that exist because of the pull of the clubs. But a huge question mark hangs over them all, with the clubs beginning to cancel their summer seasons due to coronavirus.
So far Hï Ibiza, Ushuaïa, Amnesia and Eden have all cancelled their May calendar. Pacha hosted a virtual house party with a promise to “#seeyousoon”; their latest social media post stating, “After this moment’s respite, Pacha and Ibiza will look even more beautiful.” DC-10 have cancelled their opening party and said they are currently unable to confirm any future dates at the club. Privilege have yet to comment.
Continue reading...Sleazy bosses, exploited barmaids: US cinema finally discovers the left behinds
From The Assistant to Support the Girls, American cinema is swapping feelgood escapism for gritty unsettling realism. We talk to the women spearheading this new wave
‘I wanted it to be relatable to any woman who’s ever worked in an office,” says Kitty Green of her new film The Assistant. “Everything in the film has been in the press already. But I wanted to take viewers on an emotional journey, so they could empathise with the character.”
The #MeToo saga has been examined to near exhaustion, but The Assistant manages to add something new. Rather than perpetrators or victims, it focuses on a relative bystander: a young office worker at a New York film production company. We follow this character, played by Julia Garner, through her demeaning routine: commuting in before daybreak, photocopying, printing, taking her male co-workers’ lunch orders, clearing up leftover pizza from the meeting room (as the men come in for the next meeting, she is humiliatingly caught with a crust in her mouth).
Continue reading...Tom Cruise and Nasa in talks over film to be shot in outer space – reports
Elon Musk reportedly involved in the production, which if confirmed would be first feature film ever made in space
Tom Cruise is in talks with Nasa about working on a movie shot in outer space, according to the head of the space agency.
“Nasa is excited to work with Tom Cruise on a film aboard the Space Station!,” Nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine wrote on Twitter.
Continue reading...I’ve never seen … The Terminator
For years, I have been the self-professed biggest Terminator fan on the planet. There’s only one problem...
- See the other classic missed films in this series
- The best arts and entertainment during self-isolation
I bonded with my best university buddy over many things: student radio, bland pasta, failing to talk to girls at parties, and the paradoxes of time travel, notably in the Back to the Futures, the Bill & Teds, Quantum Leap and the Terminators. In classic best friend one-upmanship, neither of us claimed to be any cop at talking to girls at parties, but both claimed to be the bigger Terminator fan. With every new Terminator movie since, I’ve dragged said mate to the cinema and sat with childlike, open-mouthed delight through an average-at-best film. I’m not sure why I like Terminator so much. I don’t know much about politics, literature or art. But when it comes to time-travelling robots, I’m a complete sucker.
In Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, John Connor and Claire Danes defeat the red leather lady Terminatrix and head off hoping to disable a non-existent Skynet HQ, only to seal their fate in a nuclear bunker. Terminator: Salvation is the one where Christian Bale went ballistic at the director and hasn’t even got Arnie in it, but it does take Terminator 2 down an alternative timeline. And talk of timelines gets me going.
Continue reading...Social distance cinema: drive-in theatres boom – in pictures
With the widespread closures of cinemas as part of measures to stem the spread of Covid-19, drive-in movie theatres around the world, where social distancing is guaranteed, have been enjoying new-found popularity
Continue reading...Judi Dench becomes British Vogue’s oldest cover star
85-year-old Oscar-winner appears in the magazine’s June issue
Judi Dench has become British Vogue’s oldest cover star, securing her first front page for the style arbiter at the age of 85.
The Oscar-winning actor was photographed just before lockdown for the magazine’s June issue, but the accompanying interview explores her experiences self-isolating at home in Surrey.
Continue reading...Colson Whitehead and This American Life among Pulitzer 2020 winners
Author wins fiction prize for The Nickel Boys while the first ever prize for audio reporting goes to an episode of the hit podcast
Colson Whitehead, This American Life and writers from the New York Times are among this year’s Pulitzer prize winners.
During an online, at-home video, the Pulitzer administrator, Dana Canedy, referred to the “deeply trying times” in which these prizes are being announced but how journalism remains as important as ever and how the arts continue to “sustain, unite and inspire”.
Continue reading...Becoming review – tantalising tour of Michelle Obama’s life
This carefully authorised documentary offers glimpses of a dazzling presence on America’s political stage
Michelle Obama is a class act – one of the classiest – and her intelligence and poise now look like something from a lost golden age. The publication of her globally bestselling memoir Becoming in 2018 brought her dazzlingly into the public sphere on her own terms. It gave her an international A-list status to rival her husband’s and provided Democrats and non-Trumpians around the world with a manifesto of decency and dignity to cling on to.
Now we have this watchable, but carefully authorised, behind-the-scenes documentary for Netflix (from the Obamas’ company, Higher Ground Productions) about Obama’s American book tour (with a stopover at London’s O2 Arena). It shows her getting in and out of armoured sports utility vehicles, chatting easily and good-naturedly with her security detail, with colleagues and family members backstage, with beaming celebrity moderators onstage (starting with Oprah Winfrey) and with people getting their copies signed in bookstores who often dissolve in floods of tears just in coming face to face with her. (I was sorry, however, that we didn’t get to see again her amusing cameo in the TV comedy Parks and Recreation, which showed Amy Poehler’s earnest public official Leslie Knope reduced to a gibbering fangirl in her presence.)
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