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14 hours ago
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Going out: Cinema
How to Train Your Dragon
Out now
This live-action remake was shot by Bill Pope, the cinematographer behind films as diverse as Clueless, The Matrix and Spider-Man 3, with puppets used on set to give the actors something to work with before painting in the CGI. Starring Mason Thames, Gerard Butler and Nick Frost.
Film on Film Weekend
BFI Southbank, London, 14 & 15 June
A whole weekend of films screening exclusively from actual physical prints? Sign us up. Physical film in a digital world is a use-it-or-lose-it kind of treasure, so to see the likes of Star Wars screened from prints, vote with your wallet and get down to the BFI.
Lollipop
Out now
Daisy-May Hudson based this portrait of a woman trying to regain custody of her kids on her own experiences of the social care system, with Posy Sterling giving a barnstorming performance as a woman who can’t get a bigger flat because she doesn’t have her children with her, and can’t get her kids back because her flat is too small.
Shadow Force
Out now
Kerry Washington and Omar Sy play a couple who leave the multinational special forces group by which they are employed to raise their child peacefully, but inevitably get pulled back into the action by a man with the grudge who unfortunately also happens to be secretary general of the G7. Catherine Bray
Going out: Gigs
Glasgow International jazz festival
Various venues, Glasgow, 18 to 22 June
Glasgow’s extravaganza opens with pianist Neil Cowley Trio’s vivacious mix of deft melodies and hard grooving (18 June). This week also features trumpeter Colin Steele’s celebration of Scottish pop icons the Blue Nile (20 June), and saxist Xhosa Cole and singer-songwriter Lulu Manning in the inventive Beyond Borders quartet (19 June). John Fordham
Nine Inch Nails
Sunday to Wednesday; tour starts Dublin
Industrial rock noise merchants Nine Inch Nails, AKA Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, tour the UK for the first time since 2022. While a new album is rumoured to be on the horizon, expect a focus on 1994’s The Downward Spiral, which gives this Peel It Back tour its name. Michael Cragg
Isle of Wight festival
Seaclose Park, Newport, 19 to 22 June
A typically eclectic selection of musical artistes arrive on the south coast of England this week, including festival headliners Sting, Stereophonics and retired man of the woods, Justin Timberlake. The likes of the Corrs, Yard Act, Ella Eyre and Busted make up some of the other acts involved. MC
Mazeppa
Grange Park Opera, West Horsley Place, Surrey, 14 Juneurday to 6 July
Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades are perennial favourites, but Tchaikovsky’s other nine operas rarely reach the stage in the UK. But Grange Park Opera is reviving one of the most vividly dramatic of them, Mazeppa is based upon Pushkin; David Pountney’s production is conducted by Mark Shanahan with David Stout in the title role. Andrew Clements
Going out: Art
Jenny Saville
National Portrait Gallery, London, 20 Juneto 7 September
The biggest British exhibition yet for this artist who paints women up close on a heroic scale, with fierce, formidable reality and a visceral fleshy palette. Is she a modern great? She certainly brings the style of Francis Bacon blistering into the 21st century. This should be a sensational show.
Masterpieces from Kenwood
Gainsborough’s House, Sudbury, Suffolk, to 19 October
Thomas Gainsborough’s great portrait of Mary, Countess Howe pays a visit to his birthplace in this show of 18th-century art. The Countess stands in swirling pink silk and white lace, posing with huge authority and command, against a romantic sky. She towers over paintings by Reynolds, Romney and others.
Summer Exhibition
Royal Academy of Arts, London, 17 June to 17 August
The annual event founded in the age of Gainsborough and Reynolds has some proud history to look back on, including JMW Turner rivalling John Constable and, more recently, regular appearances by David Hockney, Tracey Emin and more. But it has been looking lost – can it leap into life this summer?
Cedric Morris
Granary Gallery, Berwick-upon-Tweed, to 12 October
This 20th-century painter taught the likes of Lucian Freud and Maggi Hambling at his cottage art school in Suffolk. He also had a garden there and planted it with rare Irises. This exhihibition connects his gardening and art, showing how his love of nature blooms in ecstatic flower paintings. Jonathan Jones
Going out: Stage
Craig Ferguson
London, 14 June; Glasgow, 21 June
The list of Britons who are more famous in the US than here is not long: in fact, it’s pretty much only Bush’s Gavin Rossdale and Ferguson, who spent 10 years as a late-night host on US TV. But the comic hasn’t totally forgotten about his homeland; he’s making a (brief) stop-off on his latest tour, Pants on Fire. Rachel Aroesti
4.48 Psychosis
Royal Court theatre, London, to 5 July
Twenty-five years on from its Royal Court debut, Sarah Kane’s final play is being staged with the original creative team and cast – including Daniel Evans, Jo McInnes and Madeleine Potter. An unnamed patient is dealing with crippling depression; this devastating play will pull you into the darkly glittering recesses of her mind. Miriam Gillinson
The Walrus Has a Right to Adventure
Liverpool Everyman, to 21 June
Billie Collins’s tender new play is about a trio of bizarre encounters with wild animals across the globe – including a walrus aboard a boat in Oslo and a nature-filled nightshift in Tesco. What happens when animals are forced into our everyday lives and what might we learn about forging new connections? MG
PopOdyssey
Old Woollen, Leeds, 15 June
This one sounds like good fun. Described as being like an ancient Greece-themed music video, this dance-theatre spectacle from the Glitterbomb Dancers and choreographer Joseph Mercier takes on the story of Telemachus with a gen Z slant. Features an ensemble of 14 young artists playing more than 50 different characters.Lyndsey Winship
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Staying in: Streaming
Outrageous
U&Drama, 19 June, 9pm
Prison, Hitler, the Spanish civil war, hordes of famous men: there are enough gobsmacking tales from the Mitford sisters’ lives to power 10 TV shows. This rollicking series embraces the maximalist drama by weaving together their wildly divergent paths in the 1930s.
Pushers
Channel 4, 19 June, 10pm
Emily has cerebral palsy, which means people often underestimate, ignore and patronise her. It also makes her the perfect criminal: surely nobody will suspect her of building a drugs empire? Pushers is co-written by Veep’s Peter Fellows and the comedian Rosie Jones, who also stars in this cleverly premised and gratifyingly radical sitcom.
Grenfell: Uncovered
Netflix, 20 June
Not only a tragedy, but a sickening crime – and those responsible for the worst UK residential fire since the blitz still haven’t been properly held to account. This devastating documentary by Olaide Sadiq examines the oversights and malfeasance that led to the deaths of 72 people and the irreparable trauma of hundreds more.
Storyville: The Contestant
iPlayer & BBC Four, 17 June, 10pm
A genuine social experiment or just a sick joke? In 1998, a Japanese TV show asked a comedian to spend months alone in a room, subsisting only on winnings from magazine competitions. What he didn’t know was that his every movement was being broadcast; this documentary chronicles an egregious contribution to the reality genre. RA
Staying in: Games
Date Everything!
Out 17 June; PC, PS5, Xbox, Switch
Taking the dating sim to absurdist extremes, this comedy game gifts you a pair of magical glasses that turn everything in your house – from washing machines to bookshelves – into a hot person you can romance. A totally normal thing to want.
The Alters
Out now; PC, PS5, Xbox
Stuck on a planet where the sun incinerates everything every three days, a stranded astronaut clones himself over and over to create the team he needs to escape. Unsurprisingly, the clones aren’t entirely cool with it. Can you get them to work together? Keza MacDonald
Staying in: Albums
Buscabulla – Se Amaba Así
Out now
Puerto Rico via New York musicians Luis Alfredo Del Valle and Raquel Berrios return with the follow-up to 2020’s acclaimed debut Regresa. Exploring modern love, Se Amaba Así – loosely translated as “the way love was” – fuses tactile electropop with the likes of reggaeton and calypso.
Tom Rasmussen – High Wire (Remixed and Reimagined)
Out now
Originally released last autumn, the British dance-pop practitioner Tom Rasmussen’s second album gets a facelift thanks to a host of trans and queer collaborators. Planningtorock, Tsatsamis and Horse Meat Disco have all lent their talents, as has Taahliah, who elegantly elongates interlude Will You Be Mine.
Neil Young and the Chrome Hearts – Talkin to the Trees
Out now
Ahead of his on-off-but-now-on again Glastonbury headline slot, Neil Young releases his 48th (!) album. Backed by his newly formed band the Chrome Hearts, the rollicking rock’n’roll of Talkin to the Trees takes shots at Elon Musk on the riotous Lets Roll Again.
The Cure – Mixes of a Lost World
Out now
Paul Oakenfold, Orbital and Mogwai are among the 24 acts chosen to reinterpret songs from goth overlords’ recent No 1 album Songs of a Lost World, with all royalties going to War Child UK. The highlight is Four Tet’s six-minute house reworking of comeback single Alone. MC
Staying in: Brain food
Prost
BBC Four, 19 June, 8pm
Seventy-year-old former racing driver Alain Prost reflects on his career as one of the most successful drivers in F1 history in this comprehensive six-part series. Tonight’s initial episodes cover the road to his first world title.
Balancing the Books
Podcast
Writer Cailean Steed’s insightful series demystifies the often perplexing economics of writing. Speaking to writer and barrister Imran Mahmood, agent Caro Clarke and former bookseller Alice Slater, Steed discusses making a living as an author.
David Hartley
YouTube
Musician and teacher David Hartley’s video essays tackle elaborate topics such as Bob Dylan’s changing songwriting skills in under 10 minutes without compromising on detail. Highlights also include his analysis of Amy Winehouse’s autobiographical creative process. Ammar Kalia
