When Yorkshire-born Kieran Hodgson joined the cast of BBC Scotland’s hit comedy series Two Doors Down, he decided to go “all in” and relocate with his partner to Glasgow. “I haven’t done a show for ...

During lockdown, retail manager Aiden Ryan wanted to use his time constructively. Armed with only a whisk and a dream, first-time baker Ryan decided to try his hand at cake-making with a view to ...

Sixteen: it’s such a tender age, when young people are discovering exactly who they are and finding their true passions. At the age of 16, John Maher left St Bede’s College to join Buzzcocks as ...

Relax. You know the song. And you probably know the band, Frankie Goes to Hollywood. But can you recall who sang lead vocals on the 1984 track? Top pop points if your answer was Holly Johnson, the ...

Writing a pop song is more difficult than it looks. Compressing the poetic with the melodic in phrases memorable enough to catch the rhythm of the heart, its surface sheen of simplicity is the glamour ...

You know the kind of thing you’re getting with a Shakespearean comedy. Lovers falling out with each other amid some crossed wires. Someone (usually a hapless male) dressing up in ridiculous fashion.

Like the opening scene of a movie, Crewe Hall appears in all its magnificence at the end of a long drive between our world and another. We are now part of its history, an old house warmed with ...

When I was asked to review the 18th anniversary menu at Vermilion, self-styled as ‘Manchester’s most glamorous restaurant’, I thought two things: (a) after 18 years, why haven’t I heard of it? And (b) ...

Words have their own particular architecture. A scaffolding of syntax and a skeleton of grammar that both shapes and constrains the sayable. Dance, by way of contrast, has the facility to slip beyond ...

Beyond its spotlight on the first person, autobiography has the power to illuminate more widely, extending in the process an invitation to empathy. Sarah Roberts’ meticulous installation SICK presents ...

Cats get such a raw deal in Martin McDonagh’s bloody farce The Lieutenant of Inishmore that they’re mentioned in the show’s trigger warning. The poor felines are daubed with shoe polish, shot, bashed ...

History is littered with sitcoms transferring unsuccessfully to the stage or film. One of the big problems is that the joke ratio plummets when something that works in a 25-minute format is stretched ...