Much Ado About Nothing

Tim Sheader's production at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre (Photos: Saadeya Shamsuddin)

Vincent Cassel screen talk at Bafta

Cassel with film critic Jason Solomons as part of Bafta’s Life in Pictures series.

Art Against Knives: Monday 4th May Shoreditch Town Hall

A two-day charity art event held by Central St Martin’s students for a fellow colleague who was the victim of a brutal knife attack in East London will be launching tomorrow.

Art Against Knives was created to help raise funds and awareness of knife crime when 20-year-old Oliver Hemsley was stabbed by a group of youths at least eight times in an unprovoked daylight attack on Boundry Street in East London last August. Following 134 days in intensive care on a life-support machine, Oliver is now paralysed and will never walk again, requiring constant medical attention for the rest of his life.

The state of the arts in London

I spoke with the Evening Standard’s Deputy Arts Editor Richard Godwin to hear about his views on how the arts scene in London is fairing in the current climate.

Dress it up how you will ladies; burlesque is the art of glorified stripping

Camden Council and burlesque dancers across London have got their frilly knickers in a twist over the licensing of burlesque performaces. The Council requires any establishment which shows nudity on stage, and has entertainment of an adult nature, to hold the same licence held by the borough’s lap dancing venues. But burlesque dancers are arguing the nature of their performance is an art form, and oppose being categorised with strippers and lap dancers.

The story came about this week when the Evening Standard reported how regular burlesque nights held at popular music venues such as Koko and Roundhouse may be under threat if they do not acquire the appropriate licence, Striptease or art? The question for burlesque taste police.

Happy 100th

Walking down Oxford Street this week I came across some glittering lights. Turns out Selfridges is celebrating its 100th Birthday this year with the Big Yellow Festival through the month of May, beginning with a three day extravganza over the Bank Holiday Weekend.

Photo by Saadeya Shamsuddin

Sounds like teen spirit: Spring Awakening at the Novello

Aneurin Barnard as Melchio Gabor (Photo by Tristram Kenton courtesy of Cornershop PR)

Believe the hype; Spring Awakening is a youthful tonic for young and old, making no apologies for being angst ridden, volatile and touching all at the same time,  just like its teenage characters. The musical is deftly punctuated by catchy rock ditties and ballads to convey pivitol moments, the youths expressing through song what they daren’t utter in conversation, with power and humour.

For a play so steeped in controversy, it’s hard to believe one could come away so invigorated. This is in part due to the verve and energy of the cast, but also a skilled adaptation of Frank Wedekind’s orginal 1891 play which was initially banned in Germany and not performed in English for nealy a 100 years thereafter, due to its (then) shocked reception.

All good at The Kids Are All Riot

Goldie’s latest art exhibtion at Shoreditch’s Maverik Showroom packs a punch…

Arresting: Goldie greets visitors to Maverik Showroom (All photos by Saadeya Shamsuddin)

A reaction to society’s ASBO nation created by the government or a great excuse to jump on the anti-establishment graffiti bandwagon? Perhaps a little bit of both, but judging by the price tags at Goldie’s latest exhibition at Maverik in Shoreditch, only the minted will be buying, be they the likes of former Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown or City slickers wanting to feel street because they’re anything but.

Click below to view slideshow

Tingle-Tangle gets you in a spin at the National Theatre

Miss Lotte von Muller

This free exhibition adorning the foyer of the National’s Lyttelton Theatre derives its name from the German ‘tingel-tangel’, the title given to third rate theatrical variety shows during the heyday of the Weimar.  The prize winning contemporary artist Roxana Halls explores her fascination with the culture of Cabaret over the last century in a series of paintings inspired by her time spent in Berlin and her former studio, the saloon bar of a defunct 1930s London theatre, now a Bingo Hall.

Halls’ paintings are impressive to behold, giving visitors the feeling they are the sole audience in the surreal realm of cabaret entertainers, where nothing is quite what it seems…

Tingle-Tangle, until May 30. Admisssion: Free. National Theatre, South Bank, SE1

Film: Two Lovers

(Photos courtesy of Lionsgate Films)

Joaquin Phoenix has become something of an enigma. Following his renunciation of acting, along with the sparkly trappings of Hollywood for the more humble profession of lyrical wordsmith, his film fans and music critics are united in hoping he doesn’t give up the day job.

But judging from the current hobo look he sports, his aloof stare and incoherent mumblings (its rapping apparently), immortalised by his infamous appearance on David Letterman earlier this year, it looks as if Two Lovers may well be his swan song.