EVENTS LISTINGS – 17th-24th of January
by Tristan Summerscale
THEATRE
MIDSUMMER (A PLAY WITH SONGS)
Soho Theatre, London, until 6th February 2010
‘Part Richard Curtis, part Irvine Welsh’, this play concerns two thirty-somethings, a rapacious divorce lawyer and an unsuccessful car dealer, sitting in an Edinburgh bar waiting for something to happen. Of course, they end up sleeping together, and delightful romance etc ensues. This play was a big hit at last year’s Edinburgh festival and its delightful charm should help to alleviate those January blues.
For more information, click here.
BOOKS, ART
LEO JANSEN IN CONVERSATION WITH A.S BYATT
Daunt Books, Marylebone, Wednesday, 20th January 7pm
Daunt Books regularly hold events with high-profile and interesting authors in their fancy Marylebone shop. This one sees Leo Jansen in conversation with A.S Byatt, one of our nation’s most respected authors. Leo Jansen, if you were wondering, is one of the editors of Vincent Van Gogh – The Letters, a six volume work that is the product of fifteen years of scholarship and research. This may be one of the cheaper ways to find out some of the fascinating information contained in them as they retail at a whopping £395.
More info here.
FILM
OSS 117: LOST IN RIO
ICA, and other London Cinemas, from 18th January
This is the second in the series of films about Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath, a chauvinist, old fashioned and Clouseau-like French spy, operating in the 1960s. The original film was a massive hit in France, and while this new installment apparently doesn’t quite reach the same comic heights, it is nevertheless replete with chortle-worthy moments as the hero attempts to track down the French Nazi collaborators in South America.
Watch: OSS 117 : Lost in Rio (Trailer)
Info here.
ART, SOCIOLOGY
IDENTITY: EIGHT ROOMS, NINE LIVES
Wellcome Collection, until 6th April
Free
This weeks free listing is a major new exhibition at the Wellcome Collection, about what influences our sense of identity and the differences between how we view ourselves and others see us. If that sounds a bit nebulous, then this, from the gallery’s website, should make things clearer: ‘Nine individual stories introduce eight distinct rooms. One room begins with the story of scientist Alec Jeffreys’ invention of DNA fingerprinting 25 years ago, the diaries of Samuel Pepys introduce another, while self-portraiture is explored through the work of the Jewish artist Claude Cahun, who despite being sentenced to death for acts of resistance, survived the Nazi occupation of Jersey.
