Five of the best ... films

Mary Poppins Returns (U)

(Rob Marshall, 2018, US) 130 mins

Emily Blunt dons Julie Andrews’s straw hat for this long-awaited sequel to Disney’s family favourite from 1964, but it’s more of a remake, with only tiny nudges to account for the passing of time. Blunt’s nanny-in-chief is a slightly more severe creation than her predecessor, but if it’s old-school nursery comforts you want, this is the film to take you right back to the fireside.

Roma (15)

(Alfonso Cuarón, 2018, Mex/US) 135 mins

We are assuming that Netflix will do the decent thing and keep Cuarón’s brilliant family saga in cinemas even as it’s now making inroads on the streaming platform. And why not? Despite Netflix chief Ted Sarandon’s claim that Roma will look fine on phones, the big screen is definitely the best place to see this unarguable masterpiece.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (PG)

(Peter Ramsey, Bob Persichetti, Rodney Rothman, 2018, US) 117 mins

Spider-Man was always – for this writer at any rate – the most emotionally intelligent superhero, so it’s no surprise to see this latest iteration take the comic-book movie into new territory. With diverse animated Spideys issuing from parallel dimensions in human and non-human forms, it is elegant, topical and fertile enough to spawn an entire franchise of its own.

Bumblebee (12A)

(Travis Knight, 2018, US) 113 mins

The Transformers franchise has become a byword for all that is witless in 21st-century Hollywood: a brain-free zone of thunderous robots, near-moronic plotlines and gruesome upskirt photography. But without Michael Bay on board, this spin-off – featuring the yellow VW shapeshifter – tries for some actual human-machine bonding, something more in the spirit of the series’ erstwhile exec-producer Steven Spielberg. Out on Boxing Day

Holmes & Watson (Etan Coen, 2018, US)

Cert and running time TBC

Critics have been kept away from this Will Ferrell comedy, inspired by a SNL skit then reconfigured as a Step Brothers follow-up when John C Reilly joined the cast. The plot is some malarkey involving Ralph Fiennes’s Moriarty attempting to kill Queen Victoria. Could be great, could be awful, but worth a risk as a post-Christmas outing. Out on Boxing Day

AP

Five of the best ... rock & pop

Cru Cast

UK bass label Cru Cast hosts a night of what WHP refers to as “dark bassline rollers”. Two pioneers of the genre, Skepsis and Darkzy, will be on hand to drop a selection of brutal bangers fusing R&B samples with head-rattling drops, while the “MC’s MC”, grime great D Double E is also on the impressive lineup. The perfect post-Christmas blowout.
The Warehouse Project: Store Street, Manchester Boxing Day

Maya Jane Coles

As part of east London venue XOYO’s weekly club night, Pleasurehood, DJ-producer Maya Jane Coles will be ushering in the start of Christmas proper. Given she has eight EPs and two albums of her trademark house (one classic, What They Say, was sampled by Nicki Minaj in 2014), plus her darker Nocturnal Sunshine alias to draw from, expect the full gamut of dance music expression.
XOYO, EC2, Saturday 22 December

Channel One Sound System

Formed in 1979 by Mikey Dread and his brother Jah T, Channel One has become one of the world’s most influential exponents of reggae and dub. Not only have its members performed at Notting Hill carnival for more than 30 consecutive years, they have also taken their custom-built sound system all over Europe and out to Israel, Turkey, Australia and New Zealand.
Village Underground, EC2, Boxing Day

2ManyDJs

Formed by Belgian brothers David and Stephen Dewaele while promoting their debut album as Soulwax, 2ManyDJs’ ludicrous remix and mash-up experiment As Heard on Radio Soulwax Pt 2 became one of the defining albums of the early 00s. Since then, it has become the pair’s party sideline, making these post-Christmas DJing dates perfectly timed.
YES, Manchester, Boxing Day; Hare & Hounds, Birmingham, Thursday 27 December

MC

Pete Long and Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Orchestra

A fast remedy for post-Christmas torpor in the form of three nights at Ronnie’s with the club’s exhilarating resident big band, directed by Duke Ellington-devoted maestro Pete Long. For these shows, Long, trumpeter-singer Georgina Jackson and assorted guests perform Ellington’s imaginatively orchestrated 1960 Tchaikovsky dedication, The Nutcracker Suite.
Ronnie Scott’s, W1, Friday 28 to 30 December

JF

Three of the best ... classical concerts

Stephen Layton

The St John’s Christmas festival traditionally ends with the two choral staples – Bach’s Christmas Oratorio and Handel’s Messiah – and it has also become a tradition for these to be entrusted to conductor Stephen Layton and the two choruses with which he is most closely associated. He conducts the Choir of Trinity College Cambridge in Bach (Sat), and his group Polyphony in Handel (Sun). The soloists are Katherine Watson, Helen Charlston, Gwilym Bowen and Matthew Brook, with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
St John’s Smith Square, SW1 Saturday 22 & Sunday 23 December

Hansel and Gretel

Some productions of Humperdinck’s operatic version of the celebrated fairytale emphasise its dark side, but the Royal Opera’s staging is very consciously a family show. Director and designer Antony McDonald has used illustrations of the Grimm brothers’ storytelling as his starting point. Hanna Hipp and Jennifer Davis are the errant children with Michaela Schuster as their mother and Gerhard Siegel as the witch; Sebastian Weigle conducts.
Royal Opera House, WC2, Thursday 27 & 29 December

Nicky Spence and Roger Vignoles

Dumfries-born tenor Spence brings a Scots theme to the first half of his pre-Hogmanay recital with pianist Roger Vignoles. There are settings of Robert Burns by Schumann and Shostakovich, and a rare performance of Benjamin Britten’s song cycle Who Are These Children?, which uses poems by William Soutar. The second half is distinctly seasonal, ranging from Thea Musgrave to Rodrigo and Respighi, and ending in Strauss and Wolf.
Wigmore Hall, W1, Friday 28 December

AC

Five of the best ... exhibitions

A Pirate’s Life for Me

Pirates have been part of childhood since Robert Louis Stevenson wrote Treasure Island. This exploration of the modern world’s favourite cut-throats offers classic seasonal family entertainment with antique toys and archive materials. Highlights for young visitors include interactive playscapes and an actual pirate ship.
The V&A Museum of Childhood, E2 to 22 April

Spellbound

This exhibition is a Christmas ghost story about our obsession with the supernatural. The spooky curiosities on view include a human heart preserved in a silver case, the magical apparatus of Elizabethan occultist Dr John Dee, and real-life relics of English witch beliefs that look like props from a very nasty horror film.
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, to 6 January

Klimt/Schiele

This double bill of two of art’s most libidinous is one of the exhibitions of the year. Gustav Klimt’s flowing nudes, designs for his huge mythological paintings, and portraits of charismatic women make you want to live in Vienna in 1900. His younger contemporary Egon Schiele reveals the tension and anguish of being young in the dying Austro-Hungarian empire. It culminates in a feast of erotica that is like being on Freud’s couch.
The Royal Academy of Arts, W1, to 3 February

I Want to Be a Machine

Andy Warhol was that rare thing: a modern artist who loved Christmas. While this exhibition does not include his many Christmassy drawings and designs, the humanity that shines through his tough images does feel truly seasonal; there’s a compassion here, coming from a man who secretly worked in soup kitchens. Eduardo Paolozzi’s giant versions of toy robots also make for good Christmas art in this comparison of two pop pioneers.
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, to 2 June

Lorenzo Lotto

The poor as well as the rich of Renaissance Italy live on in the paintings of this subtle, sensitive artist. Lotto’s religious scenes are moving, whatever you choose to believe; one even shows his landlord with the Virgin Mary and was painted in lieu of rent. In his grand portraits of an art collector surrounded by broken sculpture and a woman posing as the ancient Roman heroine Lucretia he gets at something fleeting: the very souls of his sitters.
The National Gallery, WC2, 10 February

JJ

Five of the best ... theatre shows

The Wizard of Oz

The ultimate American fairytale, The Wizard of Oz came alive in the most expensive film that MGM had made to date, costing $3m in 1939. Liam Steel’s production makes a few changes (the lion is female, the Wicked Witch of the West is played by a man and the Munchkins are rendered as puppets) but retains the fantastical pull of L Frank Baum’s original tale.
Birmingham Repertory Theatre to 13 January

The Scarlet Pimpernel

The team behind last year’s The Little Mermaid puts on this comedic, punky-looking adaptation of Baroness Orczy’s tale. It is Paris 1792, at the height of the revolution, and a masked hero is helping French poodles, and their owners, to safety. Christopher William Hill’s larky version, comes with songs and outrageous fashion.
Theatre Royal: The Egg, Bath, to 13 January

A Christmas Carol

Returning from last year is this version of the seasonal favourite penned by Jack Thorne (best known for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child), directed by Matthew Warchus, and starring DCI Banks’s Stephen Tompkinson, who takes over from Rhys Ifans. Their version explores the reasons for Scrooge’s misanthropy and achieves a blend of social critique and festive fun. You can also catch Simon Callow’s one-man version at London’s Arts Theatre, WC2, to 12 Jan.
Old Vic, SE1, to 19 January

Fiddler on the Roof

Trevor Nunn returns to the Menier Chocolate Factory after directing A Little Night Music there to put his stamp on this perennial favourite. Andy Nyman – best known for co-writing Ghost Stories and his work with Derren Brown – is Tevye the milkman, tasked with marrying off five daughters. The score by Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick includes Sunrise Sunset, Matchmaker Matchmaker and, of course, If I Were a Rich Man.
The Menier Chocolate Factory, SE1, to 9 March

Hot Gay Time Machine

One half of this double act is Toby Marlow, also part of the creative pair behind slick and sassy hit Six, a Spice Girls-style musical retelling of the plights of Henry VIII’s half-dozen wives. He joins forces with Zak Ghazi-Torbati in a high-energy cabaret show that was well received at the Edinburgh festival fringe this year. There are songs and jokes about coming out to Mum, and some gentle lampooning of stereotypes. Trafalgar Studios 2, SW1, to 5 January

MC

Three of the best ... dance shows

Birmingham Royal Ballet: The Nutcracker

Projection designers 59 Productions (War Horse, An American in Paris) sprinkle some digital fairy dust on Birmingham Royal Ballet’s Nutcracker, filling the Albert Hall with falling snow to add to the winter wonderland of Clara’s journey through the Land of Sweets in this Christmas spectacle.
Royal Albert Hall, SW8 Fri to 31 December

Birmingham Repertory Theatre: The Snowman

There are only a couple of weeks left to catch Raymond Briggs’s friendly frolicking Snowman, brought to life by Birmingham Rep for a 24th year. With Walking in the Air – and flying – what else could any small person and accompanying adult want at Christmas?
Peacock Theatre, WC2, to 6 January

Dane Hurst: Animalis

Former Rambert dancer Hurst choreographs responses to Dulwich Picture Gallery’s Ribera: Art of Violence exhibition. The dancers perform within the gallery, embodying some of the victimhood and voyeurism to be found in the works of the 17th-century Spanish painter and print-maker.
Dulwich Picture Gallery, SE21, Sun to 27 January

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