Saturday, September 14, 2024

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Competition time

We're delighted that The Independent will once again be exclusive news partner for the wonderful Henley Literary Festival, which takes place from 28 September to 6 October. Our journalists will be interviewing some of the line-up's biggest names, including Jacqueline Wilson, David Nicholls, David and Yinka Olusoga, and Sir Anthony Seldon. Other must-see talks include Gabby Logan, Michael Palin, Shirley Ballas and Rick Stein.

This weekend, IndyArts subscribers have the exclusive chance to win tickets, with one prize of £250 worth of tickets and an overnight stay at the festival's official hotel partner, The Relais Henley, during the festival (breakfast included). In addition, five runners-up will win £50 of festival tickets.

All you have to do is answer the following question:

Jacqueline Wilson's new adult novel Think Again re-visits the characters of her teen series Girls in Love. What was the title of the second book in that series?

To be in with a chance of winning send the correct answer to this question to competitions@independent.co.uk.

Entrants must be 18 or over, a UK resident (no shipping of prizes overseas) and only one entry per person is permitted. Answers must be received by 23.59 on 15 September. The winner will be contacted via email by 16 September and the winner will be the first valid entry picked at random. All tickets are subject to availability, depending on the venue. The hotel room includes a double room on a B&B basis. The room is for a maximum of two guests. Only breakfast is included, dinner is available at an extra cost and would need to be booked in advance.

Full T&C's can be found here.

Film | Will & Harper

In the middle of the pandemic, Will Ferrell received an email from an old friend. They'd met in 1995 when both joined the sketch show institution Saturday Night Live – he was a performer, she was a writer. She'd defended his talents from those who doubted him, then wrote many of his best sketches, and together they'd go on to collaborate on a number of movies, from Casa de mi Padre to Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga. And, now, she had something very important to say: at the age of 61, she is ready to tell him – and the world – that she is trans. Later, she'd name herself Harper Steele. Will & Harper, a Netflix documentary directed by their friend, Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar's Josh Greenbaum, shows us what happened next.

Clarisse Loughrey | Chief film critic

Art | Van Gogh: Poets and Lovers

It happened to me in Room Two. There are six in the National Gallery's first ever major Van Gogh exhibition – no less than 61 works painstakingly assembled from museums and private collections around the world. All are from the period 1888-90, after the painter moved to Arles, in the south of France, and before he moved back to Auvers-sur-Oise, on the outskirts of Paris, in the few brief months before his death, aged 37, in July 1890, from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Many were painted during the year the artist spent in an asylum at Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, outside Arles. Taken together, they represent the great flowering of Van Gogh's genius, and there are several acknowledged masterpieces here. The show has a theme, of course, which we'll get to – but first, sooner or later, if you visit this exhibition, it'll likely happen to you, too. You'll be looking at a painting and your heart will simply explode with joy.

Chris Harvey | Culture writer

Theatre | Why Am I So Single?

Sweeter and frothier than pink prosecco, Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss's new musical is squarely aimed at the girls, gays and theys. If that phrase sets your teeth on edge for any reason, this show definitely won't be your (appropriately bedazzled) bag. It's this writing duo's long-awaited follow-up to their 2017 Fringe-to-West End breakout show Six, a punchy pop concert hosted by Henry VIII's mistreated wives. Here, Marlowe and Moss shrug off the cloak of historical respectability to focus on two millennial friends having a very tuneful moan about their woeful love lives.

Alice Saville | Chief theatre critic

Film | Speak No Evil

Is it justification enough for Speak No Evil to remake a 2022 Danish horror purely for the spectacle of a beefed-up, foaming-at-the-mouth James McAvoy hollering his way through The Bangles's "Eternal Flame" with teary-eyed, yet distinctly murderous sincerity? In short, yes. James Watkins's rehash of Christian Tafdrup's coolly sinister original, which goes by the same title in English, is the cleaner, tamer, and less daring of the two. Yet both films play up to their cultural peculiarities, and if you're willing to trade in the Nordic bleak for a little Anglo-absurdity, this new iteration has its own charms.

Clarisse Loughrey | Chief film critic

The Egot-winning artist has turned his attention to children's music for the first time with new album, My Favorite Dream. He chats politics, parenting and pregnancy journeys with Helen Coffey – and explains why social media trolling has lost its power over him and Chrissy Teigen.

Read an extract from our Saturday Interview below…

Of course he's a romantic. Legend's work – all nine albums of the stuff – has made him synonymous with a particular kind of syrupy, lovestruck easy listening. A lazy Sunday morning? Throw on "Ordinary People". First dance at your wedding? What about "All of You"? But he's also a bit more interesting than that: a man with opinions and stances, who speaks eloquently and passionately about politics, misogyny and social justice.

There are more facets still when one considers his eclectic CV (which would definitely take up more than the requisite two pages): songwriting, record producing, film producing, theatre directing and acting are all on the roll-call of accomplishments. He played the piano for Lauryn Hill and sang on Jay-Z and Alicia Keys tracks before his solo career took off; he's dabbled in pop and funk, as well as his "home" genre of R&B; he's even done the ubiquitous Christmas album and produced a Broadway show. Now, he's aiming to conquer the world of children's music.

Read the full interview here

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