London News

Former Strictly Come Dancing finalist Julian Clary has given this year's hopefuls some extra training at Queens Park Rangers' football ground.

Shares in banks, builders and companies part-owned in the Middle East fell around the world on Thursday and investors sought safety in government bonds on worries about Dubai's ability to pay its debts.

Caption: ' Harry Potter ' star Daniel Radcliffe resembles the Tin Man from 'the Wizard of Oz' in his shiny suit outside the 'Late Show with David Letterman' Daniel Radcliffe outside Ed Sullivan Theatre for the 'Late Show With David Letterman' New York City, USA .... HARRY POTTER star IAN HART is facing police action after allegedly threatening a ...

BURNHAM model girl Poppy Rivers frequently appears in some of the top UK lads' magazines and has achieved her ultimate goal, a regular slot on page three of The Sun newspaper.

Stateside legiters are keeping a close eye on the latest play by Alan Bennett, "The Habit of Art." The show, which opened earlier this week at London's National Theater, is Bennett's follow-up to "The History Boys," the hit that not only raked in 5 million for the National but went on to a Tony-winning Broadway run.

Colin Firth joined by Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Gambon, Timothy Spall and Derek Jacobi in biopic about reluctant wartime monarch George VI With the people ... George VI and Queen Elizabeth meeting air raid victims in London's East End in April 1941.

Alan Bennett has a lot on his mind in his latest play, "The Habit of Art," including creativity, aging, fame, anonymity and sex, and it hangs together because of his gift for language and fine stagecraft, and some splendid performances.

If Alan Bennett had written a play about W.H. Auden and Benjamin Britten we would probably have welcomed it and slipped easily into suspending disbelief, into relishing his version of the great men.

Alan Bennett is that peculiarly British thing, a writer who is both barbed and beloved, contrary and cuddly.

"It is fleshy and voracious, grown fat upon its appetite for people and for food, for goods and for drink; it consumes and it excretes, maintained within a continual state of greed and desire." This is how Peter Ackroyd, impassioned scholar of London, describes the greatest city in the world.

Grace Brothers, the TV department store where sitcom Are You Being Served? was set, is to reopen its doors one final time - to sell off items owned by its most famous star.

Interview: Paul Giamatti - 'It would be nice to just be the funny guy. Or the calm guya ' To read this article in full you must have registered and have a Premium Content Subscription with the The Scotsman site.

From The Vicar of Dibley to Father Ted , the calling of the cloth has produced comedy gold.

It's like playing darts, but you miss the bull's-eye over and over again. You can't help but wonder: Will I ever hit it? I've had some good luck lately, landing a role in the new Garry Marshall film, " Valentine's Day ." In the movie I have a few great scenes with Jessica Biel.

With a single dessert and just two glasses of wine our bill was kept in check - but the effort of doing so was not much fun Babbo This is a film with beautiful performances and a visual style that urges you towards reflection Bright Star Although the first half of Kwei-Armah's production is pacy, funny and intelligent, the energy level then drops ...

Origin of the specious ... William Chubb and Ronan Vibert in Gilbert Is Dead. Photograph: Tristram Kenton Robin French made his mark five years ago with a short Royal Court play, Bear Hug, about a couple who greet their son's transformation into a bear with perverse optimism.

ORPHAN : If you can get past the icky notion of demonizing orphans -- and that's a big if -- you'll discover a genuinely terrifying chiller about a 9-year-old monster -child whose adoptive parents rue the day they brought her home from the orphanage.

What makes a British cultural institution? Style? Sophistication? In the case of comic magazine Viz, the ingredients are swearing, toilet humor, and biting satire.

Sir Stanley Spencer was a British painter . Spencer studied at the Slade in London, but he spent most of his life in the village of his birth, Cookham in Berkshire.

London has a lot of theatres. Generally, that's where you go to see plays. Sometimes though, a production runs away from the theatre, gets lost, and ends up somewhere a little different.