Writing about Freda Jackson, the star of both the play No Room at the Inn and the film made of it, I suggested her husband, the artist Henry Bird deserved a post of his own. But it seems they were very much an item. Bird's Guardian obituary records:Henry regarded talent as an obligation and he served his own with exemplary devotion. He could not understand people who appeared to take art less seriously. Many regretted their hastily expressed opinion too late in the face of one of his uncompromising rebuffs. His late wife, the actress Freda Jackson, viewed her own ...
"It didn't matter if many of the voices expressing these opinions online were paid for by multiple accounts, boosted by dark digital analytics, or indeed often outright replicants run by troll farms hosted and funded by hostile foreign countries. If the Supreme Court had ruled that corporations were people, why not networks of bots and troll armies?" Peter Jukes explains the rise and fall of the dark money and online culture war strategies that put Donald Trump in the White House and pushed Britain out of the EU. Vince Cable looks at what may happen to British farming after Brexit."The ...
After the year they have had, small businesses need a break. So many have struggled as a result of the pandemic, either unable to trade or severely restricted. Think of all those little independent shops who have been closed, open, closed and open again throughout the year. The weeks before Christmas should be their busiest time. The first Saturday in December is always Small Business Saturday, a day when we encourage people to support small businesses. This year it has even more resonance. We would miss the vibrant diversity of our local communities if we lost these assets. Lib Dem ...
Terms of Endearment won the Oscar for Best Picture of 1983, and also four others, Best Director (John L Brooke), Best Actress (Shirley MacLaine beating Debra Winger), Best Supporting Actor (Jack Nicholson beating John Lithgow), and Best Screenplay from another medium (John L. Brooks again). That year's Hugo winner, Return of the Jedi, got a special award for visual effects (deservedly) The other Best Picture nominees were The Big Chill, which I have seen, and The Dresser, The Right Stuff and Tender Mercies, which I haven't. It's not super popular among IMDB users, who currently rank it 17th for the ...
It's been said before but now, surely and finally, we are only days away from Brexit. The UK ended its EU membership at the start of 2020, but within the next 4 weeks it will have left the building at last. So, what next for the army of 'Remainers' that mobilised in unprecedented numbers to oppose the Conservative Party's defining, winning yet destructive policy? Negotiations are on-going but the outcome is far from certain - and whatever is agreed is guaranteed to fall short of what was promised. Regardless, Brexit will be 'completed' within the month - whether we like ...
It is widely agreed that Citizen Kane is one of the greatest movies ever made. When it came out in 1941 it sealed Orson Welles' reputation as a young genius, though it was not a commercial success initially. Its celebrity grew over the decades, not least because of Greg Toland's dramatic black-and-white cinematography. The screenplay, [...]
Fri, 12:56: RT @jsher88888: When I was a kid we got the polio vaccine. My dad, working on Mary Poppins, asked how my day was. I told him about the vacc... Fri, 14:48: Erewhon, by Samuel Butler The writing is stodgily Victorian, enlivened by the na�vely devout narrator who thinks the Erewhonians are the Lost Tribes of Israel and wants to export them to Queensland to make them Christian. #nwbooks https://t.co/lKzB2igL1E https://t.co/loHeNwwOlj https://t.co/jMteBnd8zz Fri, 15:17: Sevenacide, by Robert Shuster A set of stories trying to link horror tropes with rugby, not always with great success. #nwbooks https://t.co/C8J1UPtGxE https://t.co/Uy8juDmxdq https://t.co/qzClzwDkg8 Fri, ...
It is Marina Hyde in this morning's Guardian column who comments on the ability of Ministers to dig themselves into a hole through lies about Britain's role in the development of the first authorised vaccine, who suggests that some touchy-feely Downing Street apparachit should ring up every offending minster and scream: "You're only supposed to dead-cat BAD NEWS, you absolute braindead amateurs!" I know how she feels. As the Independent points out Ministers have been accused of risking an increase in vaccine hesitancy among the public by making "wildly inappropriate comments" about the "brilliance" of Britain in becoming the first ...
i) births and deaths 5 December 2001: death of Michael Leeston-Smith, director of the story we now call The Myth Makers (First Doctor, 1965). 5 December 2013: death of Barry Jackson who played Ascaris in the story we now call The Romans (First Doctor, 1964), Jeff Garvey in Mission to the Unknown (First Doctor era, 1965) and Drax in The Armageddon Factor (Fourth Doctor, 1979). ii) broadcast anniversaries 5 December 1964: broadcast of "Day of Reckoning", third episode of the story we now call The Dalek Invasion of Earth. This is the fantastic episode with Jenny, Barbara and Dortmun fleeing ...
Dundee has again been well represented in the national Green Flag Awards and Scotland's Beach Awards, with the city receiving eight awards in total. The Green Flag Award project is run by Keep Scotland Beautiful and aims to recognise and reward well managed parks and green spaces. Dundee has improved on its total number from last year, with Riverside Nature Park winning in its first year of entry. Chair of Friends of Riverside Nature Park, Ian Ford, said: "All of the Friends of Riverside Nature Park are delighted to gain a Green Flag Award at our first attempt and with ...
