New books, movies and TV dramas you need to read and watch this year.
LES MISÉRABLES
After nearly a decade since the last sell-out U.K. tour, Cameron Mackintosh’s acclaimed Broadway production of Boublil and Sch.nberg’s musical Les Misérables comes to the Festival Theatre.
This brilliant new staging has taken the world by storm and has been hailed “Les Mis for the 21st Century”. With scenery inspired by the paintings of Victor Hugo, the magnificent score of Les Misérables includes the songs ‘I Dreamed a Dream’, ‘On My Own’, ‘Bring Him Home’, ‘One Day More’, ‘Master Of The House’ and many more. Seen by over 120 million people worldwide in 45 countries and in 22 languages, Les Misérables is undisputedly one of the world’s most popular musicals.
GEORGE EZRA
Ezra burst on to the scene in 2014 with his mega-hit ‘Budapest’. After a small hiatus from releasing any music, 2018 saw the release of sophomore album Staying At Tamara’s. His new record has spawned big U.K. hits like ‘Shotgun’ and ‘Paradise’. Ezra is further doing his bit to increase the stock of human happiness with a comeback album that is cheerful and cheering, mindful and soulful, heartfelt, energetic and energising. Staying At Tamara’s is about getting away, getting on and getting high – on music, and life, and love.
HEART BERRIES
BY TERESE MARIE MAILHOT
Unflinching and sometimes brutally personal, Terese Marie Mailhot’s debut memoir delves into her coming of age on the Seabird Island Indian Reservation, and how her experiences as a Native woman inevitably painted her struggles with mental illness, her role as a mother, and her work as an esteemed writer. With concise, lyrical prose, Mailhot illuminates her history – an abusive parent, a teen marriage, and a child removed from her care by the courts – in a way that feels as much like an elegy as a collection of memories.
CAPTAIN MARVEL
The film is set in the 1990s and explores the powerful hero’s adventures in the time before Captain America and Iron Man came to prominence. Carol Danvers becomes one of the universe’s most powerful heroes when Earth is caught in the middle of a galactic war between two alien races.
WAR HORSE
War Horse tells the powerful and uplifting story of young Albert (Lee Armstrong in his National Theatre debut), his beloved horse Joey, and the unimaginable obstacles they overcome both individually and together.
At the heart of the show are life-sized puppets which bring breathing, galloping, charging horses to thrilling life on stage. Filled with stirring music and some of the most innovative stagecraft of our time, War Horse is a remarkable tale of courage, loyalty and friendship, and an unforgettable theatrical experience.
AN AMERICAN MARRIAGE
BY TAYARI JONES
The oft-underused epistolary format gets a revival in this fraught, racially-charged romance. The story revolves around Roy and Celestial, newlyweds with a seemingly ideal life – right up until Roy is arrested for a crime he didn’t commit. Through seven years of imprisonment, the couple’s messages expose the unravelling of their marriage as anger and suspicion take hold and Celestial grows closer to long-time friend Andre. Subtle and carefully-executed, Jones revitalizes familiar tropes with a modern, intrinsically American sensibility.
KT TUNSTALL
The feisty Scottish singer-songwriter with a Brit, an Ivor Novello and a Scottish Style Award under her musical belt returns with new material. Tunstall released her fifth studio album, KIN, in September 2016, after a break from the bright lights of performing. Singles from the album include ‘Evil Eye’ and ‘Hard Girls’.
DUMBO
Another Disney classic is headed for a live-action remake with Dumbo set to arrive in our cinemas in March.
A young elephant, whose over-sized ears enable him to fly, helps save a struggling circus, but when the circus plans a new venture, Dumbo and his friends discover dark secrets beneath its shiny veneer.
