He has been condemned as a “serial swindler”, who duped art investors into parting with an eye-watering $86m, but his victims will never forget the charm and charisma of Inigo Philbrick. The suave American dealer, with a gallery at an exclusive Londo

In this series we ask authors, Guardian writers and readers to share what they’ve been reading recently. This month, recommendations include Terry Pratchett’s fantasy novels, a guide to writing and some gripping spy novels. Tell us what you’ve been r

Even when he’s laid up in bed with Covid, Penn Badgley looks far too good for ordinary humans to relate to. “I’m pleading with people to believe that I’m like them,” he deadpans from under a duvet, fully aware of his pin-up status for fellow woke mil

I was obsessed with writing songs to begin a gig with. I’d say: “We’ve got to have an opener!” I’d been working on this groove with Roger Taylor, our drummer. It just wouldn’t go away. We played it at every soundcheck, every rehearsal, trying to make

What can a 19th-century landowner teach modern British women about their sexuality? Rather a lot, it turns out – especially if that landowner is Anne Lister. The “first modern lesbian”, as she is considered by some, has been an inspirational figure e

It’s a profoundly strange experience to interview Janine Mikosza immediately after reading her debut, Homesickness. The book is a meditation on the nature of memory, truth and reckoning with past trauma – and it’s presented as one long conversation i

There aren’t many writers who radically remake their style over the course of their life: we might think of Joyce’s revolutions, Woolf’s renewals, or what Jeanette Winterson called the “furnace work” that Eliot undertook on his mature style for Four

I’d forgotten how Bend It Like Beckham begins: with a spoof BBC football commentary in which Gary Lineker, Alan Hansen and John Barnes wax lyrical about the silky skills of Jesminder “Jess” Bhamra. It’s a fantasy, obviously, which is why her mum soon

Danny Boyle is sitting in his kitchen sounding faintly surprised that his latest project has been made at all. “It’s so not the story that everybody wants to be told,” he says, “but it is the story that should be told.” Pistol, a six-part miniseries,

Next week, Hollywood will take an estimated $300m gamble on Top Gun: Maverick, the sequel to a film released 36 years ago. Right now, one of the hottest projects at the Cannes film festival market, where rights are sold to as-yet-unmade films – is th

“I’ve written lots of things that I’ve happily forgotten about, or that have been remembered fondly,” says Matthew Jacobs. “But the Doctor Who TV movie is very much like a tattoo that just won’t go away.” What is it like to make one sizeable contribu

In 2018, following a bruising divorce, the British singer Sarah Brown was “broke, financially, emotionally and spiritually – I had nothing to live for”. At her lowest ebb, she turned to a voice that had given her crucial guidance and succour when she

It all started with three oranges. One school breaktime in Jimma, western Ethiopia, Bibi and Bichu Tesfamariam saw a teacher throwing fruit into the air. “He had three oranges and started doing tricks, and me and my brother were like: ‘Wow, this is t

Olivia Bennett’s VHS collection started at a charity stall. She had grown up in “the type of family where we’ll always have a movie on in the background,” she says, but it wasn’t until high school that her personal interest really bloomed. It was 201

Are we finally getting some good disability representation in fiction? Certainly, the publishing industry seems to have belatedly recognised the need to get disabled writers through the door. After a successful social media campaign, Amazon has recen

I didn’t love reading at all when I was young. As a teacher, I loved it, and now as a reader, I love it. But I was put off the whole idea of words very early on. Some years ago, I was made to do a key stage 2 (seven to 11 years old) English test. I d

You could be forgiven for believing that we’ve already achieved the era of autonomous vehicles. Tesla, the electric car manufacturer run by Elon Musk, refers to a version of its Autopilot software as “Full Self Driving”. The company released a (misle

For some years, Yorta Yorta man Jason Tamiru’s job was to help secure “thousands of bones, hundreds of people” from museums, institutions and private collectors around the world. As a cultural heritage officer for Indigenous nations in north-west Vic

“We were the last resort for a lot of music because nobody else would touch it,” says Tony Herrington, publisher of the Wire magazine. He also once said: “Most people would take the mickey out of some bloke making music by bowing away at the femur of

After the customary red band MPAA warning that only “appropriate audiences” have their approval to watch the following preview, the trailer for Jerrod Carmichael’s new film On the Count of Three has a second, unusual title card. A trigger warning sta

When Antoinette Lattouf’s father suggested she pursue hairdressing instead of journalism, he warned people may not like a woman like her. “Especially not one who has so many opinions,” he had said. In her nonfiction debut, the Australian journalist r

When JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone she didn’t just bring the characters to life with words, she also drew illustrations. They were not included when the book was published, but now the author’s original drawings will appea

There are a couple of old iPods in my desk drawer still, tangled up with cables that will definitely come in useful one day. One is a Shuffle that I clipped to my T-shirt during a brief attempt to have a jogging phase. The other is a scuffed, black,

Full disclosure. I don’t like Steve Coogan. But when the Guardian asked me to interview the controversial funnyman, I jumped at the chance – and not just because I’ve been replaced by a younger presenter on the BBC’s magazine show This Time, and have

Nearly 60 years after her death, the entertainment industry’s attempts to resurrect Marilyn Monroe continue apace. Earlier this week, Andy Warhol’s 1964 silk-screen portrait of the actor was sold at auction for $195m – the highest sum ever paid for a

My mum is watching TV in the kitchen, my dad is at work. The house is quiet. I assess: the TV is booming from the kitchen. My mum will be in there for a while. I switch channels. There is a naked woman on screen, covered in clay, pressing herself aga

“It’s going to be tough” says Barry Bennell to his excited young protege Andy Woodward. “But trust in me and you can go from £20 a week to two grand.” For a lad from early-80s Stockport whose mum is having to do shifts at the local chippy because his

As the last of the sun’s rays curl away from the coast in Australia’s remote north-west, Josie Alec opens her arms and sings in traditional language to a mass of ochre-coloured rocks along Hearson’s Cove. But her voice competes with the low rumble of

In my childhood, my family lived in a commune of 20 identical yellow houses on the outskirts of Copenhagen. There was dinner six days a week at the “common house”. The neighbours also shared maintenance duties, prepared after-school snacks, kept a sh

In the first five minutes of the late artist Ntozake Shange’s masterwork, for colored girls who have considered suicide/ when the rainbow is enuf, a character makes plea of witness and recognition: “somebody/ anybody sing a black girl’s song … bring