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It’s satisfying, isn’t it, when scientific brainboxes confirm what us non-academic types suspected.
Michigan State University recently conducted the largest sleep-deprivation study to date, which shows that a lack of sleep is the primary cause of human error.
Well, yes, I could have told you that. It’s why The Cry, the BBC’s new Sunday night drama which stars Jenna Coleman as a first-time mother losing her sanity to sleeplessness, has resonated with critics and viewers — it’s nightmarishly relatable.
The most painful scene shows Coleman’s futile attempts to calm her screaming baby on the long flight to Australia. I watched this just a few days after I booked our own plane tickets for the 20-hour journey with my three-month old baby to my wife’s native Montana for Christmas, so it was as if the show’s creators were livestreaming the very worst anxieties from my brain straight on to the TV.
To cement this viewing experience, my daughter, competitive at heart, I’m sure, clearly thought she could do a much better job in the role of “wailing infant” than the on-screen baby, and launched into her own impromptu audition.
So, yes, the critics are right to laud the show, but for the best examination of the sleep-addled parent’s brain, nothing comes close to topping the words of Australian comedian and composer Tim Minchin in his darkly hilarious song Lullaby, which catalogues the oh-so wrong thoughts that flit through your mind at two in the morning as you try to quieten a squawking infant in vain.
“I don’t know what else I can do to try to hush you/My heart says ‘I love you’, but my brain’s thinking ‘f*** you’ ... Hush little baby, don’t say a word/Papa’s gonna buy you a mockingbird/In the hope you get avian flu/The nice folk in A&E will take care of you.”
Frieze is causing a frenzy for art lovers
As the Frieze art fair whirls into Regent’s Park, the rest of the contemporary art world is caught in its orbit. From the Serpentine to Studio Voltaire, The Showroom to Somerset House, practically every gallery in town has a blockbuster show opening to lure collectors, museum directors and arty big wigs as they descend on London. The fairs, the shows, the pop-ups, the talks: it’s a week of art overload — an art pile-up. Only a superhero could properly see all of it.
It’s enough to make your eyes water, even without the help of Tate Modern’s “crying” room installed in the Turbine Hall.
The perfect Doctor Who for our times
Doctor Who’s ability to evolve with the changing times is key to the programme’s long-running popularity. How else could a show that predates Woodstock, the Moon landing and the Civil Rights Act still find new ways to make children dive behind the sofa in fear?
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Yet you wouldn’t know it from listening to the vocal minority of die-hard, grown-up fans who seem to perpetually fear change, as evidenced by their anger that the Doctor is played by a woman for the first time.
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As the debut episode of Jodie Whittaker airs this Sunday, the more furious fans should remember that the first appearance by Tom Baker in the role in 1974 was met with a mixed reception. With his long scarf and toothy grin, many were infuriated by his eccentricity, as a BBC audience research report found at the time. “I would like him calmed down a bit because he’s crazy,” grumbled one. “He’s too stupid for words,” whined another. Today, Baker is the most iconic Doctor of them all. Whittaker deserves as fair a shot at playing the Time Lord (or Lady?) as any other actor.
Crack down on the theatrical guzzlers
Ok, own up, who’s been getting sloshed at Salome? Audience members heading to the ENO’s production this week were made to empty their water bottles across the steps of the Coliseum because, apparently, people at past shows were caught smuggling in vodka.
Many will grumble but I’m afraid when audience guzzling and glugging goes beyond the pale, a firm hand is required. Everyone has their limits. I found mine last year at the Harold Pinter Theatre during Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, when a woman a few seats down from me unashamedly gobbled some offensively pongy sushi.
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