Going Out: Cinema

Mothering Sunday
Out now
Set in the home counties between the wars, this atmospheric Graham Swift adaptation pairs Josh O’Connor with Odessa Young in a doomed romance between a wealthy young scion and the girl next door, who works as a housemaid. Olivia Colman and Colin Firth also star.

Becoming Cousteau
Out now
Documentaries often claim to be a “deep dive” into their subject matter, but that’s more than usually true here, as the revered French oceanographer and conservationist Jacques Cousteau (who once set a record by living under the sea for 30 days), is profiled by the film-maker Liz Garbus.

Tick, Tick ... Boom!
Out Friday 19 November
Arriving garlanded with some glitzy claims to fame, this is the toe-tapping directorial debut of the Pulitzer- and Tony-winning Hamilton writer Lin-Manuel Miranda, adapting the semi-autobiographical stage musical by Rent creator Jonathan Larson for the big screen. Andrew Garfield and Alexandra Shipp provide the requisite sparkle.

Natural Light
Out now
Filmed in Latvia with a cast of Hungarian and Latvian non-actors, documentary-maker Dénes Nagy’s impressive fiction feature debut adapts and compresses Pál Závada’s sprawling novel about a soldier tasked with occupying former Soviet Union territory in Hungary during the second world war. Catherine Bray

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Going Out: Gigs

Headie One
Monday 15 to 27 November; starts Newcastle upon Tyne
Last October UK drill’s biggest star (below) – fans include Stormzy, FKA twigs and Drake – landed at No 1 with his debut album, Edna, named after his late mum. After understandable delays, he’ll finally get to showcase it on this mammoth tour, which ends with a night at Wembley Arena. Michael Cragg

KeiyaA
Saturday 13 to Thursday 19 November; starts Brighton
The Chicago-born, New York-based multi-instrumentalist emerged as one of 2020’s most arresting new artists via her self-produced, and self-released, debut Forever, Ya Girl. Featuring meditations on hurt, longing and loneliness, its genre palette takes in everything from R&B to psych. MC

Huddersfield contemporary music festival
Thursday to 22 November; various venues
Britain’s foremost showcase for new and experimental music returns. Chaya Czernowin is the composer-in-residence; premieres include works by James Dillon and Enno Poppe; and Musikfabrik, the Arditti Quartet and the London Sinfonietta are among the visiting ensembles. Andrew Clements

EFG London jazz festival
Saturday 13 to 21 November, various venues
Jazz superstars and rising talents span London at dozens of gigs city-wide, including Damon Albarn’s eclectic tribute to Afrobeat legend Tony Allen (Saturday 13 November), Israeli pianist Shai Maestro’s powerful quartet (Monday 15 November), saxist/rapper Soweto Kinch’s new orchestra work (Friday 19 November) and much more. John Fordham

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Going Out: Art

Sarah Morris
White Cube, SE1, Friday 19 November to 9 January
This New York-based painter presents a group of soft, dreamy watercolours … no she doesn’t; she continues her tough, sharp abstract evocations of big city life (above). On canvas and film she analyses modern urban architecture in uncompromisingly mathematical, formal ways. Morris kisses her hand to the new with silent irony.

Jeremy Deller
Modern Institute, Glasgow, to 22 January
The artist who produced Acid Brass and restaged the battle of Orgreave has a gift for turning politics into poetry, and vice versa. This retrospective of his posters ranges from the furious (Fuck You 2020) to more melancholy and thought-provoking statements, like I Blame the Industrial Revolution.

Ancient Greeks: Science and Wisdom
Science Museum, SW7, Wednesday 17 November to 5 June
A fresh view of ancient Greek civilisation that sees its art in the context of the intellectual explosion that started in the 6th century BC when Greek thinkers speculated on the existence of atoms, mathematics and geometry. All this is visible in their art, with its sense of cosmic beauty.

Mind and Mortality
Stanley Spencer Gallery, Cookham, to 27 March
Stanley Spencer was a magic realist, a painter of swan rituals, rural resurrections and intimate nudes. His totally individual take on modern life has an honesty and directness that echoes through later British artists from Hockney to Gilbert and George. This exhibition of late portraits reveals his final sombre thoughts. Jonathan Jones

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Going Out: Stage

A Christmas Carol
The Old Vic, SE1, Saturday 13 November to 8 January
Matthew Warchus’s sumptuous production returns to the Old Vic: Jack Thorne’s adaptation has jolts of darkness, but is also lit up by joyous ensemble work and a childlike sense of magic. Stephen Mangan stars. Miriam Gillinson

The Jungle Book
The Watermill Theatre, Newbury, Thursday 18 November to 31 December
A new musical version of Kipling’s book runs at the Watermill, which always blends theatre and song in such lively ways. There will be pyjama performances, so children can enjoy the story of Mowgli’s childhood in the jungle while wrapped up and ready for bed. MG

Ahir Shah
Swindon Arts Centre, Friday 13 November then touring to 10 March
Last seen showcasing his brainy strain of satire on Late Night Mash (The Mash Report’s post-cancellation heir), the Londoner is now taking his not quite so caustic, but still enjoyably cerebral, live show on a nationwide tour. Rachel Aroesti

Matthew Bourne’s Nutcracker!
Theatre Royal Plymouth, Monday 15 to 20 November, then touring to 23 April
Not your average Nutcracker, Bourne’s cheeky, fizzy, camp and kitsch version of the enduring Christmas show sees Clara escaping her bleak orphanage to go on a fantastical tour of the colourful kingdom of sweets, complete with dancing marshmallows and liquorice allsorts and Tchaikovsky’s endlessly melodious score. Lyndsey Winship

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Staying In: Streaming

Tiger King 2
From Wednesday 17 November, Netflix
Apparently determined to bookend the pandemic, the documentary series about imprisoned big cat breeder Joe Exotic (above) dominated the cultural conversation during the first lockdown. Now it’s returning to observe the queasy fallout from the show’s success – including the strange breed of celebrity it bestowed on its contributors.

Crime
From Thursday 18 November, Britbox
Very loosely based on his 2008 novel of the same name, Irvine Welsh’s unsurprisingly harrowing Edinburgh-set police procedural about a traumatised detective working on a missing-child case marks the Trainspotting author’s first (and, some might say, long overdue) foray into TV.

The Wheel of Time
From Friday 19 November, Amazon Prime Video
Starring Rosamund Pike, this portentous fantasy drama is adapted from Robert Jordan’s beloved novel series, whose complex, very large, medieval-like world involves a magical time cycle and thousands of characters. Think Game of Thrones, but busier and more conceptually mind-bending.

Cowboy Bebop
From Friday 19 November, Netflix
This visually dazzling live-action adaptation of the 1990s “space western” anime TV series follows a trio of bounty hunters – Spike Spiegel (John Cho), Jet Black (Mustafa Shakir) and Faye Valentine (Daniella Pineda) – as they bicker, banter and brawl their way across the universe. Rachel Aroesti

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Staying In: Games

Battlefield 2042
Out Friday 19 November
Delayed from September, from this week you can finally join friends on these enormous futuristic post-climate-apocalypse battlefields, driving planes through sandstorms and getting sniped by teenagers.

Jurassic World Evolution 2
Out now
Anyone who’s ever seen a Jurassic Park film reckons they could do a better job of running it themselves. Find out in this dino-park management game.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Out now
One of the best Star Wars games makes a return on Nintendo Switch, so you can fit saving the galaxy in around putting the kids to bed. Keza MacDonald

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Staying In: Albums

Courtney Barnett – Things Take Time, Take Time
Out now
Following 2018’s introspective Tell Me How You Really Feel, the Australian singer-songwriter (above) returns to her roots on her comfortingly ramshackle third album, weaving tender snapshots of mundane lives (see lead single Rae Street) around meandering soft rock. Co-production comes from the Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawa.

Damon Albarn – The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows
Out now
Since Albarn’s debut solo album, 2014’s Everyday Robots, the musical polymath has reunited two of his bands – Blur and the Good, the Bad and the Queen – and released three Gorillaz albums. Somehow he has also managed to carve out time for this languid song suite inspired by Iceland.

Taylor Swift – Red (Taylor’s Version)
Out now
After losing control of her album masters to her arch nemesis, record executive Scooter Braun, Swift (below) continues her series of rerecording past albums with this shiny new version of 2012’s big pop breakthrough. Phoebe Bridgers and Ed Sheeran contribute to a slew of unheard tracks extracted from the vaults.

Silk Sonic – An Evening With Silk Sonic
Out now
Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak, AKA Silk Sonic, unleash their debut album of sensual 70s soul and honeyed R&B. Completed remotely in lockdown after Mars revisited early demos the pair had recorded in 2017, the album is narrated by Bootsy Collins and features input from Dr Dre. MC

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Staying In: Brain food

Hrishikesh Hirway: What you discover when you really listen
ted.com/talks
Host of Song Exploder, the long-running podcast series unpicking the genesis of famous tracks, the baritone-voiced Hirway (above) is one of our finest explainers of sonics. In this Ted talk, he explores the underused art of listening.

Radiolab: Mixtape
Podcast
The art of crafting a mixtape is no easy feat and in this imaginative, anthropological series from Radiolab, we hear how the cassette and Walkman revolutionised access to music, as well as shaping its current sound.

Life at 50C
BBC iPlayer
Tackling the climate crisis is an increasing necessity and this documentary only cements its urgency. Filmed across seven countries, it hears from people who have been forced to flee their homes owing to extreme heat. Ammar Kalia