12 h. ago The best theatre shows of 2025: Joyce McMillan picks her highlights

Stages across Scotland were blessed with some powerful productions in 2025 but these were the cream of the crop, writes Joyce McMillan

Culture

38 h. ago The best classical recordings of 2025: Ken Walton picks his highlights

Scotsman critic Ken Walton names his top five classical albums of the year

Politics

63 h. ago The best jazz albums of 2025: Jim Gilchrist picks his highlights

It’s been a vintage year for Scottish jazz records, writes Jim Gilchrist

Politics

6 d. ago Schmaltz, theatre and sharp teeth: Wrexham reveal the hard truth about football | Barney Ronay

With the arrival of US hedge funders at Wrexham, there is no pretence any more. This is just another project, as it always wasTea and cake. Cobble-close streets. Collectivism. Sugar rush. Hollywood fairytales. And also, as of this week, a minority owner with historical links to celebrity paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.Wait! Welsh cakes! Welsh tea! Aggregated tourism benefits. The sloeblack, slow, black, crowblack, fishingboat-bobbing sea. And also, at one remove, historical links to deceased celebrity paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein. Continue reading...

Politics

9 d. ago The seven best shows to see on and off Broadway, according to a theater kid

The 2025-2026 theatrical season is in full swing, with plenty of options on offer for New York City visitors this holiday season

Politics

9 d. ago Cat Wumman, by Gerda Stevenson review: 'beautifully crafted'

This powerful collection of short stories marks its author out as one of the great contemporary champions of the Scots tongue, writes Joyce McMillan

Politics

1 week ago The seven best shows to see on and off Broadway this holiday season

The 2025-2026 theatrical season is in full swing, with plenty of options on offer for New York City visitors this holiday season

Politics

2 w. ago ‘I thanked him for ending my acting career!’ – theatre directors on their debt to Tom Stoppard

Carrie Cracknell, Nina Raine and Belarus Free Theatre’s Natalia Kaliada and Nicolai Khalezin share memories of working with the playwright and ‘guardian angel’Natalia Kaliada and Nicolai Khalezin, co-founding artistic directors of Belarus Free Theatre Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago ‘There was rage and pain and iron in him’: Patrick Marber on the great hits – and fond smokes – he had with Tom Stoppard

The director worked with theatre colossus Tom Stoppard on two smash hits. Here, he remembers their heated rehearsals, the night they stayed up watching Jaws – and the last four cigarettes they smoked togetherTom was my hero from the night I first saw Travesties in 1979. I was 15. The older kids at school did a production of it and I was spellbound; it was glamorous, sensual and completely incomprehensible. I wanted to know everything about this cool, obscure playwright. I started in the school library with the Encyclopedia Brittanica. Then I read Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead (incomprehensible) and then I read a third of Jumpers before giving up (totally incomprehensible).As an English Lit student in the mid 1980s, I studied Stoppard and found his work slightly less incomprehensible. But in 1993, I saw the original production of Arcadia and felt that same spell I’d felt as a child. Let’s call it art. And beauty. And words spoken from a stage like no one else. A couple of yea...

Events

2 w. ago Theatre reviews: Cinderella: A Fairytale | Mary Doll Poppins

The Lyceum’s festive offering finds it feet after a pedestrian first half, says Joyce McMillan

Society

2 w. ago Paddington: The Musical review – they’ve looked after this bear quite splendiferously

Savoy theatre, LondonState-of-the-art animatronics, imaginative staging, fabulous performances and some marvellous songs about marmalade make for an evening that will fill you with joy and melt your heart Here is the Peruvian bear as we have never seen him before – or so we are led to believe from the marketing of this musical, which is based on the beloved 2014 film, based on Michael Bond’s beloved books. But this is in fact exactly how we have seen him before: initially alone in Paddington station with marmalade sandwiches under his felt hat and a pleading look in his eye for strangers to be kind to outsiders such as him.This is not new fare, even if Paddington is brought to life with state-of-the-art animatronics: James Hameed is his voice and remote puppeteer, while Arti Shah is under his furry skin on stage (puppet design by Tahra Zafar). The Brown family are recognisable from the star-studded film: risk-averse dad (Adrian Der Gregorian), arty mum (Amy Ellen Richardson), adoles...

Politics

2 w. ago Experience: I was stabbed in the back with a real knife while performing Julius Caesar

Our student theatre group had the bright idea of using actual knives on stage for authenticity. The blade missed my aorta by about a centimetreAs someone committed to my craft, I’ve always believed that the show must go on. An accident in my second year of university took it to new extremes. It was the Exeter University theatre society’s annual play at the Edinburgh fringe and I’d landed the part of Cassius in Julius Caesar. The director decided that instead of killing himself, Cassius would die during a choreographed fight with his rival, Mark Antony. We also chose to use real knives, which sounds absurd, but we wanted to be authentic. The plan was for the actor playing Antony to grab my arm as I held the knife, and pretend to push it behind my back. We must have rehearsed the sequence 50 times.We were about halfway through our month-long run, performing to a decently sized audience. Dressed in our togas, with the stage dark and moody, we began the fight as usua...

Politics

3 w. ago A Christmas Carol: A Ghost Story at Alexandra Palace review — slick but not spooky enough

At least we got a smoking hot Bob Cratchit

Politics

3 w. ago A Christmas Carol at the Old Vic 2025: The ultimate ghostly tale to warm even the coldest cockles

Paul Hilton is a spritely Scrooge in this annual tradition that never fails to make you cry, laugh, and get pelted with parachuting sprouts

Events

3 w. ago The Lyceum's James Brining on the cost crisis in Scottish theatre

In spite of the recent funding boost from Creative Scotland, increased costs still mean that theatres have to work hard to balance the books, says the Lyceum’s new director James Brining. Interview by Joyce McMillan

Events

3 w. ago Theatre reviews: Gallus in Weegieland | Strangers in the Night

This year’s Tron panto is low on satire but still big on laughs, writes Joyce McMillan

Politics

3 w. ago Four in 10 Brits prefer festive 'picky bits' to Christmas lunch

Christmas dinner is undoubtedly one of the highlights of the festive season. But four in 10 Brits prefer 'picky bits' to the full meal - with baked cheese the nation's favourite - according to a survey.

Politics