Sunday 15th February 2026

Culture

From topping charts to ‘The Traitors’: An ode to Cat Burns

The chaotic new season of 'The Traitors' made me reflect on the celebrity version, and my personal favourite contestant, Cat Burns.

Spoonerisms and malapropisms: ‘You Got Me’ in review

Silent Tape Productions' 'You Got Me' is a hard-hitting story about memory, powerlessness, and the cyclical passing of time.

Will 2026 finally kill the clean girl?

The clean girl has become ubiquitous throughout celebrity culture, magazines, and social media in recent years. Her brand prescribes a lifestyle, a kind of idealised minimalism.

Nostalgic and sincere: ‘The Glass Menagerie’ in review

Crazy Child Productions staged a genuine and thoughtful adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ classic.

Julie review – Free shots, toxic relationships, immersive theatre

My ticket to see Julie resembled an invite to a birthday party, promising a live DJ and that I would be greeted by ‘partygoers’...

Who is Oxford’s Coffee Shop Artist? In conversation with Julia Whatley

Julia sees herself as the conduit through which an artistic vision is realised. Where does this vision come from? “Somewhere else.”

The Goat Review: ‘raw, absurdist, and honest’

Clarendon Productions brings The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? (Edward Albee) to the Michael Pilch studio, painfully, humorously, and soulfully. Seated in the round,...

The Busy Body Review: ‘Theatre of the Real’

The Busy Body (1709) is one of the many plays written by Susanna Centlivre. Centlivre is often referred to by critics and historians as...

Doubts on Banksy

What is so enticing – and infuriating – about this mystery man’s slapdash approach to political commentary?

Death of the Album, rise of the playlist

The album, once the definitive artistic statement in music, is being increasingly overshadowed by the rise of the playlist. Streaming platforms such as Spotify...

Dindymene: A Dream

And on the seventh day, we found HER temple, feasted on HER sight. Enthroned. Flanked by mammoths on both sides. There, there! Berry-ringed fingers on berry-strung vines:...

In the Beginning

I was alone with the earth and the sun before youcame along: there was no life, no song, not even words.My hope had been...

Mac Miller grapples with mortality on ‘Balloonerism’

When the 'D' rings out from the organ on the dream-like second track of Mac Miller's Balloonerism, it feels like the beginning of an...

The Secret History characters as Oxford tropes

Donna Tartt's novel The Secret History is set in an exclusive college in Vermont but can be read as a satire of Oxford and its students. It invites us to question how little differentiates us from the elitist American universities.

Nosferatu: From Murnau to Eggers

Over one hundred years since its first screening, F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror (1922) is not as terrifying as it once was,...

In conversation with ‘The Children’

‘If you’re curious as to how and why cows, nuclear reactors, tricycles, peperami, and old people doing yoga all fit into one play…come and...

The Ultimate Picture Palace: A Profile

The Ultimate Picture Palace has been at the forefront of Oxford’s cinema scene for over a century. First opening in 1911, under the enthusiastic...

Sanskrit drama returns to Oxford

Building on a strong recent tradition of plays performed in Sanskrit (with surtitles!) we are delighted to present this beautiful drama from ancient India,...

Maria – Pablo Larraín’s grab at ‘high art’

Countless documentaries have been made, and even more biographies published on the life of Maria Callas (1923-1977). She has become a mythical woman upon...

“Wait and Hope” – The Count of Monte Cristo: Review

The Count of Monte Cristo premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2024 to little fanfare. However, it turned out to be a stunning...

To Julian – Ella O’Shea

you’re enwombed within stone, this anchorhold,wool on your skin, the draught on your feetink on your nose, barley in your teeth.to look at a...

The Globes and what we’re getting wrong

“Thirty years ago,” Demi Moore told a wildly enthusiastic Golden Globes audience, “I had a producer tell me that I was a ‘popcorn actress’...

Five Hip-Hop Gems You Missed in 2024

A year dominated by the Kendrick Lamar-Drake beef, 2024 made it all too easy to let underground hip-hop slip through the cracks into obscurity....

Hot springs: why Iceland is a breeding ground for musicians

Whilst for many, Iceland is associated with plane-grounding volcanic eruptions and sweeping landscapes, it is equally home to a surprising number of recognisable artists...

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