Barbican Centre

This planet is weird, right? We’re all just here, going to our silly little jobs, meeting our silly little friends, staring at our silly little smartphones.  As it turns out, it’s not all about us. ‘Our Time on Earth’ reminds us there are actually other living things here too, even if we’ve been a bit neglectful of them. It’s an exhibition about interacting with the rest of the ecosystem, when that very ecosystem is crumbling more and more by the day. But it’s more of a fantasy than a warning: it’s a wild proposal to create a future that could almost, maybe, still be in our reach.  Taking place across multiple spaces in the Barbican, with the majority in The Curve, ‘Our Time on Earth’ is radical and hopeful, interactive and immersive. It opens with a tall, mesmerising projection of a ceiba pentandra tree, its multi-coloured roots flowing with nutrients as the installation slowly turns. It’s a statement about the vibrancy of the natural world, and a reminder about how much humans have sacrificed to build our way of life today.  It’s about interacting with the rest of the ecosystem, when that very ecosystem is crumbling by the day What followed is slightly more disappointing. Don’t get me wrong, the ideas here are good. Smirka Wahikwa’s fabric forest, a passage of material banners emblazoned with statements about indigenous communities, reminds us that the supposedly innovative proposal to live in harmony with nature isn’t as radical as it seems. Later, it talks about using ro

‘Anything Goes’ returns for 2022, with an all-new cast, headed up by Kerry Ellis as Reno Sweeney, Denis Lawson as Moonface Martin, Simon Callow as Elisha Whitney and Bonnie Langford as Evangeline Harcourt. This review is from 2021, of the production’s original UK cast. We should cherish musicals like ‘Anything Goes’ for lots of reasons. But a big one is that I don’t think anyone would write it today: its mixture of timeless songs, virtuosic wit and an offhandedly back-of-a-fag-packet book speaks of a different age when nobody much cared what musicals were *about* just so long as the talent was there. And what talent! Based around songs by the great Cole Porter, it has a book by PG Wodehouse and Guy Bolton that ended up being drastically rewritten by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse for reasons that seem historically disputed. Not that anyone seems to mind because ‘Anything Goes’ has proven to be a whomping big hit that’s been merrily tinkered with over the years: one of its biggest numbers, the peerless Porter standard ‘It’s De-Lovely’, wasn’t even added until 1962, 28 years after the musical premiered. You can see why its flimsiness has proved so enduring: just as ‘Anything Goes’ cheered up audiences in the 1930s – which, lest we forget, were awful – so it’s undoubtedly a tonic for our gloomy times. This was my first time back in a capacity theatre since last March, and the first time since then that I’ve been in an audience that wasn’t mostly masked. I am very much on the f

Carolee Schneemann created some of the most famous works of performance art of the twentieth century – including the genuinely iconic 'Interior Scroll' - and is long overdue a proper celebration. The American artist used her interdisciplinary approach to tackle topics like sexual expression, the objectification of women and the violence of war, often using her own body as the main subject. Powerful, influential, important art. 

This autumn, the Barbican Curve Gallery is being filled with portraits of feminist icons from pre-Revolution Iran by Soheila Sokhanvari. The miniature paintings will be hung against backdrops inspired by Islamic geometric art, turning the whole gallery into a meditative space of celebration and worship. 

From ‘Les Mis’ to ‘Wolf Hall’ via ‘Matilda’ and ‘Nicholas Nickleby’, the RSC’s greatest triumphs have arguably not been Shakespeare plays at all, but blockbuster stage adaptations of classic books and films. And now the venerable company – whose artistic director Greg Doran has recently announced he’s stepping down – is returning to its London home the Barbican this autumn and Christmas with what might well be its next big hit. ‘My Neighbour Totoro’ is a lavish new adaptation of the legendary Japanese animation Studio Ghibli’s 1988 film about a pair of young sisters who move to the countryside for the summer while their mother recovers from an illness. There, they encounter a world of magical creatures, including the eponymous Totoro, an ancient forest protector. Executive produced by Joe Hisaishi who wrote the original film’s score, and given the blessing of Hayao Miyazaki, Ghibli’s legendary founder (and the film’s writer-director), this isn’t actually the first stage version of one of the studio’s feature films (Southwark Playhouse tackled ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’ a few years back), but it’s by far the biggest, anywhere in the world, including Japan. Mixing live acting, animation and puppetry, ‘My Neighbour Totoro’ will be directed by the great Phelim McDermott, adapted by Tom Morton-Smith (who wrote the magnificent RSC smash ‘Oppenheimer’) with production design by Tom Pye, costumes by Kimie Nakano, lighting by Jessica Hung Han Yun, movement by You-Ri Yamanaka and Hisaishi’

Simon McBurney’s legendary theatre company Complicite returns with its first major theatre show since it mind-blowing ‘The Encounter’. ‘Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead’ is a brand new stage version of Nobel Prize-winning Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk’s singular novel, a powerful and compelling mix of noir thriller and righteous eco-manifesto. It’s in no way an easy proposition to bring to the stage – which is kind of the exact point of Complicite. Tickets won’t go on sale until October 10, with prices, casting and exact dates TBC.