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i Reviews: Ted Lasso, Rye Lane and Guys and Dolls

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The best of this week's reviews from i's culture desk inews.co.uk  18 March, 2023 i Reviews Sarah Carson  The best of this week's reviews: Ted Lasso, Rye Lane and Guys and Dolls Good news aplenty from our critics this week!  David Attenborough’s final on-screen series is off to a beautiful start, Mia Goth is an antidote to Hollywood’s obsession with samey starlets, London’s Bridge Theatre is onto a winner with its immersive Guys and Dolls, Alice Winn has written the debut novel of the year, and Antonio Pappano’s Turandot at the Royal Opera House is so thrilling you’ll never see the likes of it again (it’s also screening in cinemas – so no excuses!)  Read on for more – and a compelling case for the maligned and misunderstood Paris Hilton.  Have a lovely weekend,   Sarah Carson i Culture Editor LIMITED TIME OFFER DIGITAL SUBSCRIPTION TRIAL - 3for3 months Unlimited access to inews.co.uk inews app Only 7.99 1 per month, for first 3 months* T e R g workovermy Start trial now You can cancel anytime TV Wild Isles couldn’t come at a more crucial time (Photo: BBC/Silverback Films/Chris Howard) Wild Isles, BBC One ★★★★  If Wild Isles is Sir David Attenborough’s final on-screen documentary series, then it’s a great one to go out on. Set closer to home than his previous outings and extolling the beauty of the British Isles, the first episode of six (though only five will be shown on TV) took us to the Welsh island of Skomer, where Attenborough relaxed with a circus of puffins. As ever, he radiated warmth and curiosity, but also took the opportunity to inform us of the climate change issues threatening our own landscape. “Never has there been a more important time to invest in our wildlife,” he warned — Ed Power. Click here to read. Christine McGuinness: Unmasking My Autism, BBC One  ★★★★  Until she was 33, Christine McGuinness (TV presenter and ex-wife of comedian Paddy) was one of the tens of thousands of women whose autism went undiagnosed. Three years on, she wanted to explore why so many autistic women and girls struggle without a diagnosis, resulting in this powerful and urgent documentary. A shocking number of autistic women and girls have endured sexual abuse and eating disorders learned McGuinness, who revealed she experienced the same issues at a younger age. Just as she felt less alone meeting fellow autistic women, this film will have made others watching at home feel the same — Emily Baker. Click here to read.  Ted Lasso, Apple TV+ ★★★★  The second season of Jason Sudeikis’s nicey-nicey football comedy was a bit of a letdown, but the first episode of the third (and final) set of episodes does enough to save it from relegation. While AFC Richmond coach Ted (Sudeikis) continues to kill with kindness, his former assistant Nathan (Nick Mohammed), now manager of West Ham and Ted’s rival, has turned into the nastiest man in football. Still warmhearted and sweet, Lasso seems to have clawed back some of its premiership-worthy storytelling — Rachael Sigee. Click here to read. Paula, Channel 4 ★★★  Paula Yates, the 90s TV presenter best known for interviewing celebs in bed on The Big Breakfast, was once just as famous as Princess Diana. Or so argued Channel 4’s tribute to Yates, which inevitably ended up being more of a clip show than an insightful window into her life. Robbie Williams, Grace Dent and hairdresser to the stars Nicky Clarke were among the contributors sharing their fond memories of Yates, whose charisma was so palpable you forgave Channel 4 for playing back its own archive footage — Gerard Gilbert. Click here to read. Film Zachary Levi in Shazam! Fury of the Gods (Photo: AP/Warner Bros. Pictures) Shazam! Fury of the Gods ★★  Shazam! Fury of the Gods seems like a kids’ adventure masquerading as a superhero film. Like the original, about a teenager who turns into an adult superhero whenever he says the magic word, it is a determinedly facetious affair in which the hero is always looking to crack jokes at moments of maximum peril. Even in the most apocalyptic scenes, nothing very much is at stake. There are some new faces – Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu play the two daughters of Atlas who are out for revenge against humanity – and the film is amiable enough in its own goofy way. But it lacks the spark and energy of the best DC superhero pictures — Geoffrey Macnab. Click here to read.  Pearl ★★★★ In Ti West’s demented and charming prequel (or sorts) to last year’s X, an errant young woman (Mia Goth) in 1918, saddled with helping her sick father on her immigrant family’s rural farm, becomes infatuated with a local projectionist and with the idea of becoming a chorus girl – obsessed with stardom and Hollywood glamour. Soon, her violent and psychotic tendencies advance. The story is told like a primary-coloured, prettified nightmare of the past: it’s all the more disturbing because it doesn’t look like a horror movie. As the lead, Mia Goth is a strange creature: deceptively childlike one moment and sinister in the next. And god bless her for existing in the otherwise bland landscape of samey starlets — Christina Newland. Click here to read. Rye Lane ★★★★ Raine Allen-Miller’s fizzy, charming debut finds its groove somewhere between the London romcom’s celebration of its hometown (think Notting Hill and Love Actually), and the Gen-Z Netflix romcom’s search for less monolithic romantic leads (To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before). In Peckham, two recently single, Black twenty-somethings share an endearingly unromantic meet-cute between the vandalised walls of an art gallery bathroom. What follows is the most effervescent ode to the romance of wandering through a city with a stranger since Before Sunrise. The film bottles the joy of living in South London, and vibrantly celebrates its Black, immigrant, diverse community — Xuanlin Tham. Click here to read.  Allelujah ★★★ There is no false romanticism in this cinematic love letter to Britain’s National Health Service. Adapted by screenwriter Heidi Thomas from Alan Bennett’s play, and with a starry cast that includes Judi Dench, Jennifer Saunders and Derek Jacobi, it’s a drama set in a geriatric ward in a small Yorkshire hospital, which is shortly to close as part of the government’s latest cost-cutting, streamlining initiative. We’re in a world of incontinence, dementia and death as well as of mind-boggling bureaucracy. Nonetheless, Allelujah is a moving and uplifting affair – at least until it is sabotaged by a strange final reel plot twist, which seems to belong in another movie altogether, and by a late burst of preachiness — Geoffrey Macnab. Click here to read. Pop The experimental duo 100 Gecs broke out in lockdown 2020. (Photo: 100 Gecs/Instagram) 100 Gecs, 10,000 Gecs, ★★★★★     Duo 100 Gecs are impossible to squeeze into a genre, but if you had to describe their second album 10,000 Gecs (which follows 2019’s 1,000 Gecs, naturally) it would be silly, chaotic, stupid – and utterly brilliant. There’s a song about a frog on the floor called “Frog on the Floor”, a pop-punk banger reminiscent of Korn (if they were fun), “Billy Knows Jamie”, and a break-up song dedicated to a rotten tooth that needs pulling out. Is it an avant garde comment on the state of the world in 2023? Sure, if you want it to be — Kate Solomon. Click here to read.   Yves Tumor, Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) ★★★★     Yves Tumor, beloved by the underground music scene since 2017, has released an album quite unlike their previous ones. Rather than a cacophonous soundscape, this fantastically long-titled record is clever and lyrically affecting, and plays with ideas of religion and reverence (and uses half the dictionary to do so). Tumor’s voice somersaults between rough and angelic, particularly on “Parody” and some songs – “In Spite of War – sound decades old. It’ll take a few listens to even begin to understand the depths of it — Kate Solomon. Click here to read. George Ezra, O2 Arena, London ★★★     In today’s modern world, pop can often feel cynical and exploitative. But not George Ezra, whose charming, cheery songs are a reminder that this musical malarkey is meant to be fun. The 29-year-old singer was in full crowd-pleaser mode on stage at the O2 earlier this week, backed by a brass band that gave “Blame it on Me” and “Green Green Grass” a calypso feel. While there were few surprises in the set, except a noisy version of “Did You Hear the Rain?”, the crowd wanted to hear Ezra’s singalong hits ⁠–  by the time he ended the night with “Shotgun”, there was a smile on everyone’s face, including Ezra’s — Shaun Curran. Click here to read.  Stage The cast of Guys and Dolls at the Bridge Theatre (Photo: Manuel Harlan) Guys and Dolls, Bridge Theatre, London ★★★★  It is always the right time for a revival of Guys and Dolls and this is likely to be Nicholas Hytner’s biggest hit since leaving the National Theatre in 2015. He has chosen to harness the full extent of the Bridge’s flexible auditorium by scooping out the stalls and allowing up to 380 standing audience members to wander about and immerse themselves in the action. This whole production reinforces like nothing else the immediacy and thrill of live theatre. Daniel Mays brings a harried everyman charm to hustler Nathan Detroit, long-term partner of “well-known fiancée” Miss Adelaide (Marisha Wallace, full of spark and sass). Too often the romance between gambler Sky Masterson and Salvation Army “doll” Sarah Brown is relegated to a secondary position, but sizzling work from Andrew Richardson and an initially steely and convincingly conflicted Celinde Schoenmaker has us rooting for this unlikely pair from the off. Exuberant and joyful: the initial booking period for the show is six months, but it could just as easily run forever — Fiona Mountford. Click here to read.    Marjorie Prime, Menier Chocolate Factory, London ★★★★  There’s a cerebral dexterity and humane lightness that makes a success of this play set in the 2060s, where an upper middle class American family buy an AI companion to help look after the elderly Marjorie. Former Globe director Dromgoole has assembled a top-tier cast: Anne Reid is a placidly infuriating Marjorie, while Nancy Carroll gives a blistering turn as her daughter Tess. And Harrison, who got a Pulitzer nomination for the play in 2015, layers ideas upon ideas so gradually that we don’t realise how many intellectual questions we’re absorbing. In the age of ChatGPT, we’re bound to see more plays about AI. Harrison sets out the parameters of a new genre boldly and brightly — Kate Maltby. Click here to read. Turandot, Royal Opera House, London ★★★★  Antonio Pappano may have come late to the Turandot party, but boy has he arrived in style. That the first live performance of Puccini’s last opera from the Royal Opera’s outgoing music director should accompany Andrei Serban’s venerable staging is one of those alchemical moments – a meeting of worlds. In ancient China, Princess Turandot’s body-count is rising. Suitors must answer three riddles or face execution. But when Prince Calaf triumphs, he sets Turandot – sworn enemy to all men – a riddle of his own: discover his name by dawn and he will die rather than claim her. Deeply, unfashionably, unapologetically splendid, this thrillingly performed production is a parting gift from another era. See it. Once it’s gone, we’ll never see the like again — Alexandra Coghlan. Click here to read. Books  Paris Hilton performs at the Uber One Super Bowl party in Phoenix, Arizona (Photo: Marcus Ingram/Getty) Paris: The Memoir by Paris Hilton  In the 2000s, hotel heiress Paris Hilton was among the most famous people in the world. Her image – at the time one of a filthy-rich airhead desperate for fame – defines the period and its vicious celebrity culture. Her memoir is a snapshot of that era, but it is really about the darkest times in her life, with her traumatic experiences at “emotional growth” schools for troubled teens at the book’s core. Though it often reads like the BeDazzled teen diary in which Hilton used to record “cheerleader drama”, this is an evocative, compelling attempt by the star to throw off the shackles of her perceived persona and define her own identity — Emily Bootle. Click here to read. In Memoriam by Alice Winn  It’s a fool’s errand, surely, to make the First World War the setting of your debut novel. But while Alice Winn recreates events that have been comprehensively covered elsewhere for 100 years now, she does so with both an epic sweep and an incredible intimacy that makes In Memoriam feel vividly alive. We begin in 1914 at an elite boarding school in England, where Henry Gaunt is secretly in love with his best friend Sidney Ellwood, unaware that Ellwood feels the same. Gaunt enlists in the British army and Ellwood soon follows him to the trenches, where their relationship blossoms against a backdrop of unimaginable horrors. This is a book filled with death and suffering, but also with life and longing. You read it with your heart in your throat, and your knuckles white. The debut of the year — Nick Duerden. Click here to read.  Old God’s Time by Sebastian Barry  In the mid-90s, when sexual abuse in the Catholic Church came to light, former policeman Tom is shaken from his retirement in Dalkey by the arrival of two Dublin Garda who are investigating a notoriously nasty priest. Eventually, Tom feels driven to help, in part because he was abused as an orphan – and his involvement in the case triggers a reckoning with his own past. For all its concern with universal themes of memory, loss and violence, Old God’s Time is a state of Ireland novel that will live long in the minds of its readers. Fairly short in length but vast in its scope, this is the work of a master storyteller. Click here to read. Art Gallery view of Souls Grown Deep like the Rivers at the Royal Academy of Arts (Photo: David Parry/Royal Academy of Arts) Souls Grown Deep Like the Rivers, Royal Academy, London What happens when an elite academy exhibits work by artists excluded from higher education? That’s the question the RA’s latest exhibition celebrating the works of Black artists from the Southern states of North America forces visitors to ponder. In this space, Lonnie Holley’s sculptures, Loretta Pettway’s quilts and Joe Ligh’s paintings are somewhat sanitised, presented with none of the sound, music, clutter or life that accompanied the works when first made. Still, Souls Grown Deep... is an invigorating show, charged with symbolism and defiance — Hettie Judah. Click here to read. Mike Nelson: Extinction Beckons, Hayward Gallery, London ★★★★ Don’t confuse Mike Nelson’s latest show with the current trend for pre-night out “immersive” art experiences – you’re more likely to need a bourbon alone in a dark room after a visit to the Hayward Gallery’s new exhibition than a jolly night on the Aperol Spritz. The highlight piece, a series of interlinked spaces with seemingly no escape called Deliverance and The Patience (2001/23), is curious, disconcerting and, at points, panic-inducing. Originally shown 20 years ago, these works have been made to feel fresh and relevant to a modern audience – a remarkable achievement — Hettie Judah. Click here to read.  More culture * You's Penn Badgley: 'I do feel for Joe — it’s bleak and saddening and awful'   * John Simm: 'You can't taint every single police officer with the actions of despicable people'  * ‘Snorting your way through it catches up with you’: The mental health toll on touring musicians  * It's time for The Apprentice to drop the interviews  * Callum Scott Howells: 'I’m very upset about how Wales has been treated'  Get in touch What are you watching/reading/listening to? Email me at [email protected] or tweet me @carsonsarah and I'll respond in a future edition of the newsletter. Do you know somebody who would enjoy this newsletter? Ask them to sign up here. Read more culture Sign up to more newsletters You have received this email as you are opted in to newsletters from inews, published by Associated Newspapers Ltd. You can update your email preferences to choose the types of emails you receive from Associated Newspapers Ltd, or   from all future emails. 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