REPORT after report is published detailing “systemic” or “structural” racism in some of our major institutions. Fears of anyone “whose skin is a different shade” (as Hammerstein put it in South Pacific) fill some sections of our media, and fear of ultra right-wing action against them inform others. Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird…

STUNNING is the only word to describe Martyn Jessop’s performance as The Creature in the Street Theatre production of Nick Dear’s riveting adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Director Adam Lanfranchi chose this play, first seen in 2011 at the National Theatre, with no thought of caution. His programme notes underline that its exploration of the…

IT is never a good idea to take over a job when the previous incumbent has been highly successful, but there is always an exception to every rule and Amelia Freedman well and truly proved that when, just over 30 years ago, she took over the role of artistic director of the Bath Mozart fest…

WRIGHT and Grainger are two men who met at school and both became obsessed with the Greek myths and their timeless relevance, which is certainly having a moment in these days of divided nations at war, very silly people who think they are gods and mindless people who bolster those delusions. The duo has developed…

HOW many times have you commented that air travel is really no fun any more? Dutch choreographer Emma Evelein has captured the fear, tension, vulnerability and apprehension of travellers in her brilliant Gallery of Consequence, one of a double bill performed by Rambert dancers for the current tour, and on stage at Bath until Saturday…

ENGLISH Touring Opera’s visit to Bath went from the sublime, Benjamin Britten’s prickly high drama of Andre Obey’s play The Rape of Lucretia, to the “cor blimey”, with a Donald McGill seaside postcard production of Gaetano Donizetti’s The Elixir of Love. Both operas had modern settings. Lucretia drew parallels with the way in which women…

THERE is no question that Venice makes an indelible impression, and that mixture of enchantment, beauty and menace was never better captured than by Nic Roeg’s 1973 masterpiece Don’t Look Now, with Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland at its heart. In 2007 playwright Nell Leyshon created a stage adaptation of the Daphne du Maurier short…

MATINEE audiences can be tricky – there are some wonderful stories about remarks made by elderly ladies at matinee performances of Waiting for Godot. The principally late-middle-aged audience that filled Bristol Old Vic to watch this beautifully staged 1930s-style production, were definitely not a great asset to the cast, with their muted and slow reactions…

A FAVOURITE saying of my father, when he had just driven a nice new, but underpowered car was “Lovely bodywork and interior, but couldn’t pull your cap off your head”. It is nowhere as drastic as that, but in many ways, under Loveday Ingram’s carefully structured direction, Ann-Marie Casey’s stage adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s…

PUCCINI’S Madama Butterfly, one of the great staples of romantic opera, is so well known for its earworm Humming Chorus and its aria Un bel di (One Fine Day is a highpoint in every soprano’s repertoire), that you sometimes don’t remember what the story really says about American imperialism and the very different religious and…