From council estate to outer space: Michaela Coel’s career is going stratospheric. You’ll know her as the writer and star of the adorably filthy, funny, London-set comedy Chewing Gum, a sleeper hit for Channel 4 that went worldwide after being picked up by Netflix. But the 30-year-old is next to be seen in the new series of Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror. Continue reading “Michaela Coel on her Black Mirror episode & future of Chewing Gum”
Latest writing
Review: The Jungle, Young Vic
Welcome to The Jungle. Take a seat at one of the makeshift tables surrounded by tarpaulin and chipboard walls. This is the Afghan Flag restaurant, one of many establishments that grew up in the Calais refugee camp – recreated here to evoke the powerful community that also grew up there.
Opinion: By cancelling Andrea Dunbar’s play, the Royal Court has silenced an urgent female voice
The decision this week to cancel Rita, Sue and Bob Too, Out of Joint’s touring revival of Andrea Dunbar’s 1982 play – which features an older married man sleeping with two teenage girls – feels like a misstep.
Review: Goats, Royal Court
Yes, there are real goats in Goats. And very lovely they are. But they serve a serious function too: in Syrian writer Liwaa Yazji’s play about the conflict, a goat is given as compensation for each martyred son.
Dali and Duchamp: these mischievous mavericks shaped the 21st century
Marcel Duchamp and Salvador Dalí: two titans of modern art who might appear to have little in common. One is the father of conceptual art; the other is famous as a painter – and just as famous for embracing fame. But in fact, the pair were pals.
Book review: Speak Well of Me, W. Sydney Robinson
I reviewed W. Sydney Robinson’s biography of Ronald Harwood for the TLS
She Was About to Quit Acting. Then She Got the Role of a Lifetime.
I did an interview with Denise Gough for the New York Times. Full profile here.
A new London theatre aims to stage a revolution
I interviewed Sir Nicholas Hytner for a piece for the New York Times on the opening of his new Bridge Theatre, Young Marx, and why new writing needn’t be worthy.
Review: Network, National Theatre
“I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore”: the rallying cry from Paddy Chayefsky’s 1976 film about Howard Beale, a news anchor who loses it on-air, has become a much-quoted meme, as the film seems only more prophetic with each passing year.
The ‘most painted woman in the world’
She is known as ‘the most painted woman in the world’: around 225 artists have captured the captivating likeness of Suzy Solidor, including Tamara de Lempicka, Jean Cocteau, Francis Bacon, and Man Ray.