It promises to be a wonderful autumn for London’s theatre-goers. Ivanov, Tom Stoppard’s adaptation of Chekhov’s early play, has opened the ‘Donmar at Wyndham’s’ season, to superb reviews. Joining it in a quest to bring the increasingly dowdy West End into repute is No Man’s Land, Harold Pinter’s 1975 masterpiece, revived at the Duke of York’s with Michael Gambon and David Bradley assuming the roles of Hirst and Spooner initially taken by the great knights, Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud (and, 17 years later, at the Almeida, by Pinter himself opposite Paul Eddington).The Norman Conquests, the three-parter with which Alan Ayckbourn conquered the West End three decades ago, is being staged at the Old Vic. The major opening at the National Theatre is Oedipus, with Jonathan Kent directing a cast including Ralph Fiennes, Alan Howard and Clare Higgins in an adaptation by Frank McGuinness of the Sophocles tragedy. Also at the National, Howard Davies directs Gethsemane, a new play by David Hare.
Art
‘Blockbusters’ are tiring to do on foot, and often tiresome to contemplate when the real joy of looking at paintings is best undertaken in cosier galleries, far from the madding crowd. Yet it is hard to ignore the Tate pairing of Mark Rothko (Modern) and Francis Bacon (Britain). Nearly 40 years after his death Rothko’s work has retained its value (artistically speaking). Bacon, one feels, was overpromoted in his lifetime, and there is usually a price to pay for that, no matter what prices his work fetches. At the National Galley a major exhibition called Renaissance Faces brings together portraits from Van Eyck to Titian.
Books
After dealing with ‘last thoughts’ in his previous novels, Everyman and Exit Ghost, Philip Roth goes back to Fifties America for his novella, Indignation (which, as one reviewer noted, could just as easily be titled Ejaculation). This may not be ‘major’ Roth like Operation Shylock or American Pastoral but it is not slight. Read it. Read everything by Roth, a true modern master. Read also In Zodiac Light, the latest novel by Robert Edric, the underrated Englishman, whose book evokes the sad life of Ivor Gurney, poet, composer and shell-shocked soldier. PD James is in fine form in The Private Patient where Kate Miskin rivals Adam Dalgleish, her commander, for significance. As ever, James makes the grey London dawns seems a natural phenomenon, and the Thames remains one of the principal characters (though not yet a suspect!). For pleasure, and a good guffaw or two, Debo Devonshire’s letters to and from Patrick Leigh Fermor. In Tearing Haste makes an ideal autumnal companion.
Music
This promises to be the most interesting winter for music-lovers; indeed, the start of many interesting winters. Vladimir Jurowski, the brilliant Russian principal conductor of the London Philharmonic, has been joined on the South Bank by Esa-Pekka Salonen, who takes charge of the Philharmonia. With Jiri Belohlavek doing outstanding work with the BBC Symphony, and the LSO in prime form, whoever the conductor is, London is blessed. Hopes are also high outside the capital. Vassily Petrenko, the 32-year-old from St Petersburg, has made a big impression in his first year with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, and Andris Nelsons, a Latvian two years junior, has begun his sophomore season at the City of Birmingham Symphony. In Manchester the Halle, not so much revived by the newly-knighted Sir Mark Elder as restored, can claim to be the finest orchestra outside London.
Lovers of Mahler’s symphonies should note the recent recording by Deutsche Grammophon of the composer’s Tenth Symphony, in the performing version by Deryck Cooke, by the Vienna Philharmonic, under the English conductor, Daniel Harding. Until Harding conducted it in Vienna four years ago, this great orchestra, which has Mahler’s music in its blood, had never played the symphony, which was left incomplete on Mahler’s death in 1911. Even Simon Rattle, Harding’s mentor, could not persuade them to tackle it, so full marks to Harding, the LSO’s principal guest conductor, for proving that even the mighty Viennese can be taught a trick or two.
Autumn treat
What else but Ken Dodd at the London Palladium on Sunday October 12? The greatest comedian, living or dead, returns for one night only to the theatre where, in 1965, he established the house record by playing twice nightly for 42 weeks. The show starts at 6.30pm. It will end whenever he feels like it. Doddy may be 80 but he still packs a punch.