Going out: Cinema
Parthenope
Out now
Selected for Cannes last year, the latest from Paolo Sorrentino, director of The Great Beauty and Youth stars Gary Oldman. And per Sorrentino’s Fellini-esque motifs of feminine elegance and the visual splendour of Italy, he casts Celeste Dalla Porta in a decade-spanning coming-of-age story about a young woman born in the sea near Naples in 1950.
Thunderbolts
Out now
Florence Pugh plays trained spy Yelena Belova, adoptive sister of Natasha Romanoff, AKA Black Widow, from which you may gather that we are again engaging with the intricacies of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Yelena and her allies are up against Julia Louis-Dreyfus as a villain called Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. You’ll believe a bolt can thunder.
Scotland’s Folk Film Gathering
To 11 May, Edinburgh
Edinburgh’s Folk Film Gathering returns to the Cameo and Scottish Storytelling Centre, with new and archive cinema, live music and stories. This year includes performances from Irish fiddler Benedict Morris, Welsh harpist Gwen Màiri Yorke and Edinburgh’s Ukrainian choir.
Queer East Festival
To 18 May, various London venues
The annual festival of cinema and performing arts is back with more than 100 titles showcasing queer culture across east and south-east Asia, including (as the closing gala) the UK premiere of the documentary Edhi Alice, an exploration of the trans experience in South Korea, from queer activist Ilrhan Kim. Catherine Bray
Going out: Gigs
Twenty One Pilots
5 to 14 May; tiur starts Glasgow
Released last year, US alt-rock duo Twenty One Pilots’ seventh album, Clancy, marked the final part of a nearly decade-long conceptual series. While the more intricate details of it all mightmay get lost on this cavernous arena tour, it’s is likely to be a fiery, cathartic spectacle. Michael Cragg
The Excursions of Mr Brouček
Barbican Hall, London, 4 and 6 May
Simon Rattle may no longer be the LSO’s music director, but his cycle of Janáček’s operas continues. Composed in 1920, the rarely performed Excursions of Mr Brouček is a satire of capitalist greed as personified by the beer-swilling Brouček, who journeys to the moon and back to the 15th century. Andrew Clements
Patrick Wolf
8 to 16 May; tour starts Manchester
Ahead of next month’s seventh album, Crying the Neck, his first since 2012, the idiosyncratic Wolf heads out on tour. Having dabbled in pulverising electro experiments, string-drenched ballads and synthpop symphonies, Wolf is a jack of all trades who can weave the threads together live. MC
Jason Moran
Milton Court Concert Hall, London, 9 May
The Texan virtuoso pianist/composer Jason Moran has been taking listeners on startling journeys across jazz-rooted contemporary musics since the 1990s, often in illuminating mixed-media performances. On this solo-piano show, Moran celebrates the enthralling paintings of African-American artist Noah Davis. John Fordham
Going out: Art
Huma Bhabha and Giacometti
Barbican Centre: Level 2, London, 8 May to 10 August
The slender, elongated bronze statues of Alberto Giacometti depict people who seem to defy a general catastrophe. They keep going when all they have left is themselves. Karachi-born Bhabha draws on global mythology and art history. She kicks off a year-long programme of “encounters” between contemporary sculptors and Giacometti’s masterpieces.
Robert Thomas James Mills
CCA, Glasgow, 3 to 24 May
Modestly enough, this exhibition claims to offer a chance to think about time, space, the cosmos and your innermost being. On the other hand isn’t that what all art is ultimately for? Glasgow artist Mills uses drawings and sound to personify time itself as his lover, in a temporal breakup.
Lisa Milroy
Kate MacGarry Gallery, London, to 31 May
This painter known for still lifes of shoes and other everyday objects takes to the skies in her latest works. Her expansive new paintings of the open sky transport you away from material things. Pink tinged clouds hang in spaces of ultramarine blue. Memories of a Vancouver childhood glow bright.
That Marvellous Atmosphere
Stanley Spencer Gallery, Cookham, to 2 November
Like a ruined medieval fresco, Stanley Spencer’s unfinished painting Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta transports you to a world of rollicking, Chaucerian fun. This painting, which he worked on for his last decade, teems with roly-poly people and a sacralisation of joy, in a lovely day out on the water. Jonathan Jones
Going out: Stage
Ed Night
The Lowry, Salford, 7 May; touring to 31 May
The Plunge may sound like a checklist of zillennial tropes: OCD, body dysmorphia, emotional support animals. But don’t expect worthiness from Night. He uses irreverence and a vaguely menacing delivery to give the classic comic misanthrope a modern twist. Rachel Aroesti
Gary Clarke Company: Detention
Nottingham Playhouse, 8 & 9 May, touring to 15 October
Choreographer Clarke has ploughed a fruitful furrow of dance-theatre-documentary, exploring social issues close to home, from the miners’ strike to the beginnings of rave culture. His latest work looks at the impact of Clause 28 as a young gay man growing up in a Yorkshire pit village. Lyndsey Winship
The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives
Arcola theatre, London, to 31 May
Three wives. Seven children. A very big secret. Lola Shoneyin’s story of Baba Segi stole hearts as a novel, with its upending of expectations and raucous reveal. Now Rotimi Babatunde’s vivid stage adaptation returns, featuring live Yoruba music and dance. Kate Wyver
Takeaway
Liverpool Everyman theatre, to 17 May
The Hyltons Caribbean takeaway was built with love and a mouth-watering menu. But with the rise of food delivery apps, the future of the family-owned restaurant is uncertain. Amanda Huxtable directs Nathan Powell’s joyful story has big laughs and full bellies. KW
after newsletter promotion
Staying in: Streaming
Poker Face
Now & Sky Max, 8 May, 9pm
As a human lie detector, casino worker Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne) has been blessed with superpowers – but don’t expect any turgid comic- book business from this quirky detective series created by Knives Out director Rian Johnson. Season two brings reams of great guests, including Cynthia Erivo and John Mulaney.
The Handmaid’s Tale
Channel 4, 3 May, 9pm
It’s been eight years since June Osborne (Elisabeth Moss) began fighting the patriarchal regime that kept her enslaved as a baby-making machine; in the intervening period, this adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s novel has only become more timely. This sixth and final season sees the handmaids unite in rebellion.
Marie Antoinette
iPlayer & BBC Two, 8 May, 9pm
In recent years, Lady Jane Grey, Emily Dickinson and Catherine the Great have all been reborn as bolshy yet vulnerable teen girls in a series of irreverent and largely anachronistic comedy dramas. This returning Anglo-French series is cut from the same cloth, as it traces the fortunes of France’s last queen within a chaotic and oppressive Versailles.
Families Like Ours
iPlayer & BBC F0ur, 3 May, 9pm
This ambitious Danish drama from Thomas Vinterberg – best known for co-founding the avant-garde Dogme 95 movement with Lars von Trier – imagines the entirety of Denmark being evacuated due to rising sea levels. Per its creator, this is no “climate-warning” series, but a meditation on the human ability to cope in a crisis. RA
Staying in: Games
Sonic Rumble
PC, smartphones; out 8 May
The latest attempt to reinvent Sega’s beloved mascot is an online party game where up to 32 players compete in mini-games until only one survivor remains. Yes, it sounds a lot like Fall Guys, but it’s stuffed with classic Sega characters, and developer Rovio knows what it’s doing.
Among Us 3D
PC; out 6 May
The original Among Us was one of the surprise hits of the lockdown era – a multiplayer sci-fi strategy game in which two members of a spaceship crew are baddies out to kill other players and sabotage their tasks. The new 3D version provides a first-person perspective, pulling you much closer into the tense, nefarious action. Keith Stuart
Staying in: Albums
Jenny Hval – Iris Silver Mist
Out now
Norwegian art-pop practitioner Hval’s ninth album is a typically acquired taste. On the fidgety To Be a Rose, the song’s structure continually shape-shifts, upending its pop leanings, while the 82-second long electronic curio The Artist is Absent gradually disintegrates.
Model/Actriz – Pirouette
Out now
The Boston noise-rock quartet kicked off this second album era with one of the year’s best songs. Cinderella – which tells the tale of frontman Cole Haden’s dreams of having a princess-themed fifth birthday party – is a pulsating, live-wire modern rock tornado that would have also dominated an indie sleaze-era dancefloor.
Blondshell – If You Asked for a Picture
Out now
After growing disillusioned with her early pop direction, in 2022 LA’s Sabrina Teitelbaum became Blondshell, unveiling a new grunge-adjacent sound. On this second album, produced by Yves Rothman (Kim Gordon), Teitelbaum harnesses that melodic nous on songs such as the lilting 23’s a Baby.
Yung Lean – Jonatan
Out now
Sweden’s SoundCloud-rap originator continues his creative evolution – the 28-year-old also releases music as Jonatan Leandoer96 and Död Mark – on this follow-up to last year’s Psykos. While Forever Yung bounces with a hip-hop elasticity, the indie-leaning Babyface Maniacs is a much more downcast affair. MC
Staying in: Brain food
Ologies
Podcast
Writer Alie Ward’s longrunning series delves into niche scientific obsessions, inviting a cast of experts to discuss everything from reality TV sociology to domestic phytology – the art of keeping your houseplants alive.
An Artist’s Manual Against Apartheid
Online
Poet Farah Chamma, producer LIEV and arts organisation Shubbak have put together this extensive, open-ended repository of resources for those looking to learn more about the history of Palestine and ways to enact positive change today.
The Autism Curve
BBC Radio 4 & BBC Sounds, 5 to 9 May
With diagnoses for autism rising exponentially, this five-part series provides a fascinating insight into the numbers, examining how widening definitions and greater advocacy have shifted attitudes towards neurodiversity. Ammar Kalia
