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Culture

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Entertainment

Bluey’s Daley Pearson on how losing his brother inspired his new film: ‘He was the best thing ever to me’

Allen, the first live-action film from Pearson’s Ludo Studio, follows a man who met an alien as a kid – and becomes obsessed with bringing him back Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email If, for whatever reason, you want to feel a bit sad, think too hard about what Elliott from ET would have been like as an adult. Or Coraline, or Matilda, or Chihiro, or those kids in Mary Poppins. The most amazing thing that ever happened in their lives – magic nanny, alien friend, psychic abilities, otherworldly adventures – was already over when they were kids. If that bad Harry Potter play taught us an

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Iphigénie en Tauride review – stylised staging of opera of bloodthirsty priestesses and divine intervention

Coliseum, London English National Opera’s production of Gluck’s opera has strong leads in Christine Rice, Nick Pritchard and Jacques Imbrailo. But why is it sung in French? Human sacrifice first; ask questions later. The story of Iphigénie among the Taurians, adapted from Euripides by Gluck and his librettist Guillard in 1779, is being told at English National Opera for the first time. It’s sung in French – more on that later – and staged by Lyndsey Turner, whose sparky Noyes Fludde won the company an Olivier award back in 2020. Within the narrow rectangular frame of Soutra Gilmour’s set, Iphi

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Entertainment

‘No tech, no texts, just childhood’: author Liz Pichon on the secrets behind her multi-million selling Tom Gates series

As her long-running children’s book series turns 15, Liz Pichon talks about overcoming dyslexia to become a bestselling author If you ever find yourself in an airport newsagent, it might be worth peering inside one of Liz Pichon’s books. “I do guerrilla signings,” she tells me conspiratorially. “They let me go in and I sign all the books, just in case. I love the idea of kids buying a book, going on holiday and seeing that I’ve signed it. Sometimes I write ‘surprise!’” It’s a wonder that she hasn’t got sore hands. Pichon is one of the UK’s foremost children’s authors, and this is a big year fo

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Entertainment

The efficiency trap: why optimising everything can backfire, badly

From roundabouts to the stock market, relentless streamlining could be making the world more dangerous We have all been there: packed shoulder to shoulder on the train while the person beside us coughs and sneezes. A protective flu jab offers some reassurance, but so does the thought that there will be a hospital bed for you, should you need it. Yet, in England, about 95% of adult hospital beds were occupied at the height of flu season last year. If hospitals were hotels, that level of occupancy would be good business, and we would commend them for their efficiency. But do we really want a hos

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Entertainment

How the story of ‘the girl of 100 portraits’ inspired two books

Luc Corlouër made ‘deal’ with Prix Goncourt winner Philippe Jaenada over his research into model Louise Cansot, murdered in Paris in 1949 For almost eight decades the artists’ model Louise Cansot, the subject of the novel winning France’s most prestigious literary prize this year, was one of Paris’s forgotten murder victims. After her body was found near the Seine in September 1949, city police wrote off the young woman, immortalised as “the girl of 100 portraits”, as loose, libertine and – worse – an unmarried mother. They closed their investigation after just four months having made little e

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Entertainment

‘I’ve seen people in my neighbourhood pulled out of their cars’: Ava DuVernay on the cruelty and brutality of Trump’s America

Ten years after her landmark political documentary 13th, the film-maker delivers a follow-up on the 14th amendment – and the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle birthright citizenship When I ask Ava DuVernay how she kept her focus while making her new film – or how anyone does, when the onslaught of news, fake news and disputed facts seems designed to overwhelm – she starts to answer, then stops. Her eyes have filled with tears. “I just got emotional, as you said that, because it was the film that saved me,” she says. “It’s been a very tough two years. I live in Los Angeles, and I’ve

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Entertainment

‘My dad said Great Balls of Fire was pagan music – and threw it out of the window’: Leo Sayer’s honest playlist

The singer lives by the words of John Lennon, and once did karaoke surrounded by supermodels. But which song still makes him cry? The first song I fell in love with I first heard Bob Dylan through my cousin David when I was about 16. I fell in love with his voice. Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right is still one of the best songs ever written. We were young rebels then, looking for a moral compass, while everybody older seemed to be wearing bowler hats and pinstripe suits. Dylan made us think differently. The song I inexplicably know every lyric to Astral Weeks by Van Morrison. I’m going to reco

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Entertainment

Willie Nelson: ‘I drank too much, I smoked too much. I took too many pills’

The legendary country singer says he did everything wrong. Yet now, at 93, he’s music’s last man standing. What’s the secret of his longevity? • Read an exclusive extract from Willie Nelson’s memoir here Before the interview, Willie Nelson’s publicist warns me that there’s only one thing the 93-year-old country music legend doesn’t like to discuss: the past. Which rules out talking about the 150-plus albums he’s made; the Highwaymen, the supergroup he formed with Kris Kristofferson, Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings; writing On the Road Again on an aeroplane sick bag. It also rules out talking a

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Entertainment

Richard Lloyd, founding member and guitarist of punk band Television, dies aged 75

Known for sophisticated musical style in band that played significant role in emerging 1970s punk rock movement Richard Lloyd, known for his sophisticated musical style as a founding member and guitarist for the influential punk band Television, has died at the age of 75. His family confirmed that Lloyd died on Saturday morning at his home in Chattanooga, Tennessee. “His loving wife Sheila and his dog Willie Mays were with him at the end,” his family said in a statement to Rolling Stone. Continue reading...

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Hamish Blake: ‘I was drunk. I was outside at 4am. A possum nearly pissed on my cake’

The TV and radio presenter speaks to us about his new show, his cringeworthy run-in with Toadie from Neighbours and the birthday treat that almost broke him Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email On your new series Unskilled Adult, you and your famous friends take on trades you have no idea how to do. Who was your best employee, and who was your worst? I’m tempted to give best and worst to the same person. Ryan Shelton was wildly, head-scratchingly, perplexingly frozen and inefficient. We had to cater a wedding. But ultimately he was the best because he probably made me laugh the most. Wh

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Entertainment

Hollywood banks on Ebenezer to bring Johnny Depp in from the cold

Dickens character is actor’s first big studio role after years overshadowed by legal battles with ex-wife Amber Heard “It’s good to be back,” Johnny Depp declares in the trailer for Ebenezer, in which he stars as Charles Dickens’s miserly Scrooge – his first big Hollywood studio production in eight years. The message is clear: this is Depp’s comeback, after years in which his career was overshadowed by legal battles with his former wife Amber Heard. Continue reading...

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Amy Winehouse inspired me to quit a soul-crushing job

I was driving to work feeling miserable when Rehab came on – and I realised there’s more to life than a steady wage in a job you despise At 6am on a bleak October morning in 2006, I was driving down the North Circular in London to a job I hated. I usually kept the radio low, a background murmur to keep me focused on the road. But that morning I turned up the volume allowing the buoyant bassline from Amy Winehouse’s Rehab to reverberate through my Ford Ka. As Amy’s rich voice conveyed the depths of her despair, I stared blearily at the empty road ahead and wondered how I’d taken such a wrong tu

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