Saturday Review

Saturday Review episodes:

• 03.21.2020

  The Nest, The Truth, The Bass Rock, Cranach at Compton Verney and Home Entertainment Recommendations

  The Nest is the new Sunday night drama on BBC1 that raises questions around the ethics of surrogacy as a wealthy couple invite a young woman whose past is not known to them into their lives. The Truth is a French/Japanese...

  
• 03.14.2020

  Misbehaviour, On Blueberry Hill, Abi Dare, Warhol, Breeders and Kate+Koji

  Misbehaviour is a new film about the 1970 Miss World pageant which saw the first black Miss World and was also disrupted by the nascent Women's Liberation movement who threw flour bombs at host Bob Hope Sebastian Barry's play On Blueberry...

  
• 03.07.2020

  Hilary Mantel, The Mikvah Project, Sulphur and White, Among The Trees

  Hilary Mantel's new novel - The Mirror and The Light - is the final part of her Thomas Cromwell trilogy. The previous two parts have sold millions of copies worldwide and garned prizes from all quarters. Can this one compare? The...

  
• 02.29.2020

  Portrait Of A Lady On Fire, Women Beware Women, Christos Tsiolkas, Leon Spilliaert, Noughts and Crosses

  The newest film by French director Céline Sciamma (Tomboy, Girlhood) is Portrait Of A Lady On Fire. An 18th century painter is commissioned to paint a bride-to-be's wedding portrait and falls in love with her subject Women Beware Women is a...

  
• 02.22.2020

  Midnight Family, Masculinities exhibition, Actress by Anne Enright, Far Away by Caryl Churchill, I Am Not Okay With This

  Mexican documentary Midnight Family follows a family-run private ambulance in Mexico City racing to the scenes of accidents in order to earn a living Masculinities:Liberation Through Photography, is a new exhibition at The Barbican in London, about how masculinity is experienced,...

  
• 02.15.2020

  Stoppard -Leopoldstadt, Emma, Philip Hensher, Steve McQueen - Tate Modern, The End

  Tom Stoppard has a new play - Leopoldstadt - a slightly autobiographical telling of the story of several generations of a wealthy Jewish family in Europe over 6 decades, from 1899 How many different cinematic versions of Jane Austen...

  
• 02.08.2020

  Mr Jones, Death of England, The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates, British Baroque, This Life

  Director Agnieszka Holland assembles a cast including James Norton and Vanessa Kirby to tell the story of Welsh journalist Gareth Jones who in 1933 travelled to Soviet Russia and told the truth about the famine in Ukraine. At the National...

  
• 02.01.2020

  Ingmar Bergman, The Lighthouse, William Gibson, The Art, Design and future of Fungi, Art on the BBC

  Ingmar Bergman's 1966 film Persona has been adapted into a stage play and it is the opening production at the newly revamped Riverside Studios in London The Lighthouse, starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson is a black and white film...

  
• 01.28.2020

  David Copperfield, Welkin, Motherwell, Pregnancy exhibition, Windermere Children

  Armando Iannucci has taken on Dickens' David Copperfield with Dev Patel in the lead role A new play by Lucy Kirkwood, Welkin, has opened at London's National Theatre. The Welkin is set in Norfolk in 1759, when a jury of matrons...

  
• 01.18.2020

  Beckett triple bill, Bombshell, Avenue 5, American Dirt, Tullio Crali

  A triple bill of Samuel Beckett plays has just started at London's Jermyn Street Theatre. Directed by Trevor Nunn, it's a chance to see Krapp's Last Tape as well as two lesser-known works - Eh Joe and The Old...

  
• 01.11.2020

  1917, London International Mime Festival, King Gary, Ismail Kadare, Saad Qureshi,

  Sam Mendes' film 1917 is set during the First World War and based on his Grandfather's experiences during the conflict. It's already won a Golden Globe and is touted for more awards glory. What do our reviewers make of it? This...

  
• 01.04.2020

  Little Women, War Of The Worlds Immersive Experience, Untitled Goose Game, Graphic novels, podcasts

  There's a new all-star Little Women on the big screen. The cast includes Saoirse Ronan, Florence Pugh, Emily Watson, Laura Dern, Timothee Chalamet and Meryl Streep. Louisa May Alcott's novel has been a popular text for film makers since the...

  
• 12.28.2019

  Listeners' cultural highlights of 2019

  Find out what Saturday Review listeners chose as their cultural highlights of 2019. We asked what you'd enjoyed this year and you told us about things we'd missed, disagreed about some cultural events we'd reviewed, and let us know...

  
• 12.21.2019

  Cats, Susan Hill's Ghost Story, Martin's Close, Nora Ephron's I Feel Bad About My Neck, Gypsy

  The much-anticipated film of Cats with its stellar and fur-enhanced cast including Judi Dench and Taylor Swift finally reaches the big screen. Catnip or catastrophe? Spooky offerings in the Christmas TV schedule this year include Martin's Close by Mark...

  
• 12.13.2019

  Aquarela, Swive, Robert Musil, Theaster Gates, Sticks and Stones

  Aquarela is a movie about water...filmed at 96 frames per second- four times faster than normal and there are fewer than a handful of cinemas in then world with equipment to show it properly. What's them point? ...

  
• 12.07.2019

  Fairview at Young Vic, So Long My Son, Annette Hess, John Walker, A Very Scandi Scandal

  Fairview is a Pulitzer Prize-winning play just opened at the Young Vic in London. It starts out like a conventional US African American dramedy and then begins to mess with the audience's expectations. How will our reviewers feel about it? Chinese...

  
• 11.30.2019

  The Nightingale, My Brilliant Friend, Lee Child, Troy: myth and reality, Upright

  The Nightingale is a film set in Tasmania in the brutal days of convict settlers and soldiers. A young wife faces violence as she tries to track down a man who has violated her family The National Theatre's...

  
• 11.23.2019

  Dear Evan Hansen, Feast & Fast, Greener Grass, Irenosen Okojie, Ken Burns' Country series

  Broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen has been an enormous success and has now transferred to London's West End. It's the story of a socially awkward young man who accidentally becomes a hero Feast & Fast: The art of food in Europe,...

  
• 11.16.2019

  The Gangster The Cop The Devil, Touching the Void, Romesh Gunesekera, Gold Digger, George IV : Art and Spectacle

  The Gangster The Cop The Devil is an award-winning Korean action thriller about an unlikely alliance between a maverick police detective and a ruthless mobster who have to work together to catch a serial killer Touching the Void began life as...

  
• 11.09.2019

  The Report, Shook, The Topeka School, 24/7 exhibition, The Morning Show

  The Report is a docu-drama starring Adam Driver telling the story of Senate staffer Daniel Jones and the Senate Intelligence Committee as they investigate the CIA's use of torture following the September 11 attacks. Shook is a debut play at...

  
• 11.02.2019

  Making Waves, The Antipodes, Hanne Orstavik, His Dark Materials, Joy Labinjo

  Making Waves: The Art Of Cinematic Sound is a documentary looking at (and listening to) the work of sound designers in film. What do they do and how do they affect the viewer? The Antipodes the latest play by Pulitzer Prize...

  
• 10.26.2019

  Play Well, Monos, Vassa, Elizabeth Strout, The Accident

  Play Well is a new exhibition opening at the Wellcome Collection in London, aiming to explore how play transforms both childhood and society. On a mountaintop in Colombia, eight children with guns watch over a hostage and a conscripted milk...

  
• 10.19.2019

  Non Fiction, Stillicide and The Diver's Game, There Are No Beginnings, Pre-Raphaelite Sisters, Living With Yourself

  Non Fiction is a very French film about writers and publishers debating the future of the book vs e-book. But the characters also all appear to be having affairs with each other: Tres Francais! But will our reviewers be seduced?...

  
• 10.12.2019

  The Day Shall Come, Man In The White Suit, Zadie Smith, Hogarth - Place and Progress

  Chris Morris's film The Day Shall Come, is a very dark comedy about a genuine FBI operation to deal with potential domestic terrorists in the USA. Man In The White Suit was one of the highly-successful Ealing Comedy films. Released in...

  
• 10.05.2019

  Joker, Mary Costello, A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, Dublin Murders, Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art

  Joker: What was it about the new DC comic-based film which helped it to win the highest prize at this year's Venice Film Festival? Starring Joaquin Phoenix, it's a dark affair but is it deserving of the plaudits and...

  
• 09.28.2019

  Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp, The Last Tree, The Dutch House, Mark Leckey, World on Fire

  Caryl Churchill celebrated her 80th birthday last year. She's written four new short plays for the Royal Court, the theatre with which she's most closely associated: Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp. Horror and abuse flash through often very...

  
• 09.21.2019

  The Farewell, Quichotte, Antony Gormley, Reasons to Stay Alive, Nomad: In The Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin

  Lulu Wang's personal film The Farewell stars rapper Awkwafina in its lead role as a granddaughter not sure whether she should collude with a lie about her grandmother's health. Shot mostly in Mandarin Chinese, it's been a huge success...

  
• 09.14.2019

  Hustlers, A Very Expensive Poison, Tove Ditlevsen, William Blake, State of the Union

  Hustlers is a new crime drama film based on a 2015 article in New York magazine about a group of strippers in the USA who decided to embezzle money from the men who came to their club. A Very Expensive Poison...

  
• 09.07.2019

  Rojo, Hansard, James Meek, Rothschilds at Waddesdon Manor, Defending the Guilty

  Argentinian film Rojo is set just before the 1975 military coup, looking at the simmering tensions and the complicity that made it happen and the way so many people turned a blind eye Hansard at London's National Theatre is a debut...

  
• 08.31.2019

  The Souvenir, Bait, Appropriate, Mary Beth Keane, A Confession

  Two Brit indie film productions arrive at once: Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir is a slightly autobiographical work about a struggling young film-maker's relationship with a charismatic drug addict. Also Bait; set in a fishing village in Cornwall and with an...

  
• 08.24.2019

  Almodovar's Pain and Glory, Robert Icke's The Doctor, Brassic, Peter Pomerantsev

  Pedro Almodovar's new film Pain and Glory has been hailed as his most personal to date The Doctor at London's Almeida Theatre is Robert Icke's latest production. Freely adapted from Arthur Schnitzler's Professor Bernhardi, it's a play about ethics, morals and...

  
• 08.17.2019

  Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Actually, Dora Maurer, Tea Obreht

  Quentin Tarantino's 9th offering to the world (he's said he'll only do 10, then retire from directing) is Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, part fable, part historical love letter to LA in the 60s. It deals with the...

  
• 08.12.2019

  At the Edinburgh Festivals, including The Secret River and the Pet Shop Boys Musical, Musik

  We're at the Edinburgh Festivals, including the Pet Shop Boys/Jonathan Harvey musical starring Frances Barber: Musik. Also the stage adaptation of Kate Grenville's best-selling novel about the collision between settlers and Indigenous Australians, The Secret River. As well as the...

  
• 08.03.2019

  There Is a Light That Never Goes Out, Animals, Colson Whitehead, Olafur Eliasson, This Way Up

  There Is A Light That Never Goes Out, Scenes From The Luddite Rebellion has just opened at Manchester Royal Exchange. Combining verbatim recreations and imagined encounters, it looks at Manchester and England at the beginning of industrialisation Animals is...

  
• 07.27.2019

  Bridges of Madison County, Die Tomorrow, Fosse/Verdon, Last Supper In Pompeii, David Constantine

  Bridges of Madison County began life as a novel, then became a film and is now a musical. Opening at London's Menier Chocolate Factory, it stars Jenna Russell in the lead role. How does it work on the stage? Thai...

  
• 07.20.2019

  Making Noise Quietly, Night of the Iguana, The Moon, Laura Cummings, I Am Nicola

  Theatre director Dominic Dromgoole has made his feature film debut with Making Noise Quietly; a triptych of stories about the effects of war. Tennessee Williams' play Night Of The Iguana is based on his 1948 novel and has just opened in...

  
• 07.13.2019

  The Manchester International Festival: Tree, David Lynch at Home, Parliament of Ghosts, David Nicholls. Only You and much more

  The Manchester International Festival is a biannual event, enveloping the city in a wide range of arts events across the genres. We'll be casting our critical net as wide as possible Film director David Lynch has curated a series of events...

  
• 07.06.2019

  Never Look Away, The End of History at London's Royal Court, 8 Days to the Moon, Fleischman Is in Trouble, Felix Vallotton

  Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck's first film The Lives Of Others won the best Foreign Language Oscar, his follow-up The Tourist was a critical disaster. How will his latest - Never Look Away - fare critically and at the box...

  
• 06.29.2019

  Support The Girls, The Hunt at The Almeida, Cut and Paste in Edinburgh, Grossman's Stalingrad

  American indie film Support The Girls is set in a sports bar in America where the manager's day just keeps getting worse The Hunt stared life as a multi award winning Danish film. Its been adapted for the stage at The...

  
• 06.22.2019

  Bitter Wheat, Toy Story 4, Keith Haring, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Beecham House

  Toy Story 4 hits the cinema screens. Featuring the voices of Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, Keanu Reeves, and Annie Potts - as the kick-ass heroine Bo Peep - what does the Toy Story franchise have to offer the new generation...

  
• 06.15.2019

  Diego Maradona, Sweat, Catch 22, Elif Shafak, Manolo Blahnik

  Sweat, starring Martha Plimpton was a sel-out success when it premiered at London's Donmar Warehouse last year. Now it's got a West End transfer to the Gielgud Theatre Asif Kapadia won an Oscar for his biopic about Amy Winehouse. Now he's...

  
• 06.08.2019

  Gloria Bell, Wife at The Kiln Theatre, Frank Bowling, Brian Bilston, Wild Bill

  Chilean director Sebastián Lelio's 2013 film Gloria has been remade for an English-speaking audience as Gloria Bell. Starring Julianne Moore it's extremely faithful to the original; what's new about it? Wife is the latest play by Samuel Adamson which has just...

  
• 06.01.2019

  Starry Messenger, Thunder Road, This Brutal House, Hauser and Wirth Somerset, Good Omens

  Matthew Broderick and Elizabeth McGovern in the London premiere of Kenneth Lonergan's play The Starry Messenger Thunder Road was made for $200,000 and went on to win awards at international film festivals. What was it about the film which beguiled jurists...

  
• 05.25.2019

  Memoir of War, King Hedley II, Gerald Murnane, Leonardo Da Vinci, When They See Us

  Memoir Of War,based on Marguerite Duras's book “La Douleur” is set in Occupied France. Critical opinion has varied widely from 'dreadful' and 'empty' to 'masterpiece'. What will our reviewers make of it? King Hedley II starring Lenny...

  
• 05.18.2019

  Birds of Passage, White Pearl, Thomas Harris/Denise Mina, Tale of Two Empires

  Colombian film Birds of Passage explores the emergence of illegal drug trading in the 60s and 70s and it's ghastly effects and lasting legacy on family. Corporate black comedy White Pearl has opened at London's Royal Court. About 6 Asian...

  
• 05.11.2019

  Death of a Salesman, The Hustle, The Virtues, Mark Haddon, David Nash

  The latest production at London's Young Vic Theatre is Death of a Salesman. It recasts the Lomans as an African-American family with Wendell Pierce as WIlly Rebel Wilson and Anne Hathaway play female con artists in Chris Addison's directorial debut, The...

  
• 05.04.2019

  The Long Shot, Jude, Making Your Mark at British Library, The Heavens

  Charlize Theron and Seth Rogen star in Long Shot playing an American presidential hopeful and a lovable doofus. Take a wild guess who plays which part? Howard Brenton's new play Jude -at The Hampstead Theatre - is a re-imagining of...

  
• 04.27.2019

  Eighth Grade, All My Sons, Lux by Elizabeth Cook, Stanley Kubrick, Curry House Kid

  Youtube star/standup comedian Bo Burnham has now turned his hand to film directing and his debut work is a coming-of-age tale: Eighth Grade. It's about a 15 year old girl dealing with the trials and tribulations of high school life,...

  
• 04.20.2019

  Sweet Charity, Machines Like Me, Smoke and Mirrors: The Psychology of Magic, Loro

  Josie Rourke returns to the work of Cy Coleman, who wrote the music for City of Angels; with the Broadway classic Sweet Charity. With choreography from the world-renowned Wayne McGregor, Rourke reunites with Anne-Marie Duff as Charity, and Arthur Darvill...

  
• 04.13.2019

  Wild Rose, Mary Quant, Intra Muros, The Parisian - Isabella Hammad, Life After Lock-Up and Back To Life

  In her new film Wild Rose, rising star Jessie Buckley plays a Glaswegian country singer with dreams of making it big in Nashville. The trouble is that she has two small kids and is just out of jail. ...