Arts Ahead: 11-17 Mar

By Zoe Craig Last edited 180 months ago
Arts Ahead: 11-17 Mar

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Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is showing as part of the 15th London Australian Film Festival (12-22 Mar)

We hate being negative here at Londonist, but London's art scene seems to be in Last Chance Saloon mode this week. There's lots of things closing; but sometimes that's just the way London's culture cookie crumbles.

Openings:

The London Australian Film Festival kicks off at the Barbican on Thursday with a range of shorts, features, docs and premieres to amuse and delight you. We like the sound of "Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation", a celebration of Australia's B movie history of all things bawdy, busty, brutal and bloody.

Festivals are a feature this week, with the Telegraph Hill Arts Festival starting on Friday in Lewisham. The Flamenco Festival opens at Sadler's Wells on Thursday.

On a dance theme, Tango Fire starts at the Peacock for a month from Tuesday, and ambitious collaboration piece, Destino has its UK premier at Sadler's Wells on Thursday.

Thin-pickings, theatre-wise. David Hare performs his own work, Wall, drawing on his trips to Israel and the Palestinian Territories, at the Royal Court from tomorrow. And Scar Stories at the BAC, by Patrizia Paolini, opens Friday.

Last Chance:

Traces' new brand of circus leaves town (and Sadlers Wells) on Saturday. So too, does Pied Piper, a hip-hop dance performance inspired by the Robert Browning poem at the Barbican. And sadly, Zorro swoops out of the West End on the same night. We loved it. They're swashbuckling off to France, apparently.

Ian McDiarmid stars in his own adaptation of Be Near Me at the Donmar Warehouse for the last time on Saturday. Juliet Stevenson finishes with her harrowing Duet For One at the Almeida on the same night. And Sadie Frost is a woman obsessed with Madonna in Touched... For The Very First Time for (ahem) the last time at Trafalgar Studios 2.

The new musical everyone's talking about, Spring Awakening finishes its run at the Lyric Hammersmith on Saturday. If you missed it, don't worry. It's another transfer prospect, opening at the Novello in the West End from 21 March.

Finally, Babylon comes to a close at the British Museum on Sunday. Tell us what else you're up to, and most of all, enjoy yourselves!

Last Updated 11 March 2009