interviews with leading figures from the arts
Pamela Jahn |

Kelly Reichardt has a thing about losers. You often see them in her films. It's the failure of American individualism that concerns her.

Pamela Jahn |

In his celebrated TV-series Gomorrah (based on the bestseller of the same name by author Roberto Saviano) Italian director Stefano Sollima depicted the mafia ridden neighbourhoods of Naples in its rawest form – without myth, without any gloomy underworld charm or even the slightest hint of supposed gangster morality. The message Sollima wanted to get across was clear: there are no role models, no heroes. No one is happy here. 

Thomas H. Green
Seven years ago, Soft Cell were about to perform at a sold-out O2, a one-off event they entitled, after 16 years apart, One Night, One Final Time. It…
Nick Hasted
Warren Ellis is Nick Cave’s wild-maned Bad Seeds right-hand man and The Dirty Three’s frenzied violinist. Justin Kurzel’s Australian film subjects…
Pamela Jahn
Idris Elba has only just appeared as the British Prime Minister in the action comedy Heads of State (2025) – now he's portraying the American…

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

Rachel Halliburton
Classical music makes its debut at London's K-Music Festival
Demetrios Matheou
The iconic filmmaker, who died this week, reflecting on one of his most famous films
Pamela Jahn
The actor discusses his love of self-destructive characters and the problem with fame
Pamela Jahn
The star and producer talks about taking on the role of Prime Minister, wearing high heels and living in the public eye
Pamela Jahn
The Guildhall-trained German star talks about the enormous pressures placed on nurses and her admiration for British films and TV
Pamela Jahn
The writer-director discusses first-love agony and ecstasy in 'Dreams', the opening UK installment of his 'Oslo Stories' trilogy
Pamela Jahn
The German star talks about playing the director's alter ego in a tormented family drama
Pamela Jahn
The Greek filmmaker talks about adapting Jim Crace's novel and putting the mercurial Caleb Landry Jones centre stage
Pamela Jahn
The multi-talented performer ponders storytelling, crime and retiring to run a bookshop
Rachel Halliburton
Music Director Julián Vat and pianist Matias Feigin compare notes on Piazzolla
Pamela Jahn
The Anglo-French star of 'Sex Education' talks about her new film’s turbulent mother-daughter bind
Pamela Jahn
The East German-born filmmaker explains why his biopic of the activist Hilde Coppi isn't bound to the 1940s
graham.rickson
Our critic talks about his recent film project
Adam Sweeting
She nearly became a dancer, but now she's one of TV's most familiar faces
Pamela Jahn
Exclusive: A candid interview with the master actor
Pamela Jahn
The Georgian filmmaker talks about her award-winning abortion drama, motherhood and her relationship with the unknown
Pamela Jahn
The Belgian filmmaker unfolds an all too familiar tragedy in the world of tennis
Pamela Jahn
The Portuguese director's comic melodrama takes a fantastical journey through Southeast Asia and the history of cinema
Pamela Jahn
The documentary director talks about his ominous first fiction film and why its characters break into song
Nick Hasted
The modern French master reflects on ageing, useful lies and country secrets in his new slow crime film
Pamela Jahn
The actor on her breakout screen performance capturing the frantic pulse of Mumbai, and living and working between London and India
Pamela Jahn
Peck analyses his approach to the anti-apartheid photographer's work and to his methods as a political filmmaker
Pamela Jahn
The much-garlanded actor on what playing the architect László Toth meant to him
Rachel Halliburton
An ominous shift has come with dark patches appearing on the Greenland ice sheet

the future of arts journalism

You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!

We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d

And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.

latest in today

We are bowled over! We knew that theartsdesk.com had plenty of supporters out there – we’ve always had a loyal readership of arts…
Sir Mark Elder was back on the scene of past triumphs last night as he returned to the Hallé at the Bridgewater Hall – and he has not lost…
Given that the film industry is a fairly vain business, it follows that every movie is to some extent a vanity project. So it seems…
Mavis Staples, the woman to whom a young Bob Dylan proposed marriage when they met at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival and whose voice he has…
VINYL OF THE MONTHMartel Zaire (Evil Ideas)Montenegro-born, Cyprus-based producer Martel Vladimiroff is a hard man to find out about. His…
Opening acts don’t always enjoy a full house, but at at the Royal Albert Hall at the end of a UK tour in support of Suzanne Vega and her…
What defines a life? Money and success? Happiness? Clint Bentley’s Train Dreams employs a narrator, much as Terrence Malick’s Days of…
It’s weird, right? We’ve somehow stumbled into a world where, for all we’re told that algorithms homogenise music, actually more people…
Janáček described his nature-versus-humanity fable The Cunning Little Vixen as “a merry thing with a sad end”. In which case, the even…
Perspectives on Shakespeare's tragedy have changed over the decades. As Nonso Anozie said when playing the title role for Cheek by Jowl in…