Entertainment

I suppose there really is a first time for everything. One starts to firmly believe that there is nothing – nothing! - new to be found between the covers of a book. After all, Aristotle nailed down the six elements of plot twenty-four hundred years ago and even the most experimental, supposedly plotless modern fiction has within it a structure just as finely tuned and balanced as the honeycomb of a bee hive. Well, if it's any good anyway. After...

Stories about grief always feel unbearably pertinent to those who have lost. And those who have lost often feel an unbearable urge to document their grief. Those who are left behind can find themselves in a catch 22 of sadness. My own story is for another time, but as I sit in the audience of My World Has Exploded A Little Bit at the Ovalhouse, I completely understand why this play was written. Created and performed by Bella Heesom, with...

The Senior Artist of the People’s Republic of China, Zhang Huafeng is set to exhibit 30 of his works at a private event hosted by the Clore Centre for Education in the British Museum in London. Zhang Huafeng is both a prolific and prestigious Chinese artist, integrating a Baoshi style of Chinese impressionism with heavy inks and gold dye and an academic who has organised numerous national exhibitions and programmes including the sending of 10 Chinese works of art to space...

A natural history documentary about the Scottish Wildcat is set to be filmed in 4K for the first time ever. The Tigers of Scotland feature documentary journeys across Scotland to uncover the traits, clues, underestimated threats, the landscapes and the conservation efforts which currently shape the life of the Scottish Wildcat. It will also investigate the life of the Wildcat, from past through to the present, and how they overcome the challenges of surviving when they are so close to extinction....

If the era of the grand dame is over, Liza Pulman has not got the memo. She has a lovely voice, a genuine smile, and the kind of sparkly eyes men of a certain age go totally dippy for. Throw in two dramatic gowns, a neck full of diamonds and a band called the Stardust Ensemble, and you’ve got yourself a bona fide diva. Liza Sings Streisand is an evening of just that - Pulman singing Streisand songs with a...

Anarchy! Chaos! Confusion, sex, and booze. Dancing, singing, shouting, swearing, drinking. Subterfuge! Brawls! Danger, and iambic pentameter. I'm either talking about the original Globe Theatre or Shit-faced Shakespeare, and the two are arguably interchangeable; I doubt you'll see a more historically accurate rendition of Elizabethan theatre without a time machine. Shit-faced Shakespeare is a simple concept. Take one abridged play by the bard, marinade one of the actors in a vat of booze, then let them loose in front of...

I am familiar with Kings Cross in the era circa 2011 to present. It’s the station I use to visit my parents, and I actually like them so I've been there a lot. I used to swim at the Kings Cross Pond Club too, and I made an appreciative "oooh!" noise when a branch of Dishoom opened nearby. Kings Cross and I are friends. Tom Marshman is friends with Kings Cross too, although his Kings Cross and mine are very...

1.Book Fight with Tom McAllister and Mike Ingram Writers Tom and Mike have come to feel like friends, we drink beer together, I listen to them ramble, sometimes about books and literary movements, but other times about Philadelphia, poptarts, the state of America, racoons and a baby detective who wears a denim diaper (in-joke). An irreverent mix of pop culture, politics, literary gossip and serious book reviewing. 2. The Moth The top pick, as voted by judges from within the...

“Go fuck yourself” Sven Ratzke says, kindly. Ratzke has cleverly managed to be both Dutch and German, and therefore merrily walks the line of being very easy to chat to whilst taking absolutely no nonsense from anyone at any time. Ratzke has been touring the world as the creator and star of Starman for the last two years, and in June it’s finally coming to London. At this juncture a writer will normally tell you what their interviewee is wearing,...