From The Sheep Detectives to Rivals: your complete entertainment guide to the week ahead

Hugh Jackman and Emma Thompson star in a farmyard mystery, while the spirited bonkbuster returns for a smutty second outingThe Sheep DetectivesOut now Few can claim a writing career as varied as Craig Mazin, creator of TV’s Chernobyl, co-writer of several Scary Movie and The Hangover films, and co-creator of The Last of Us. Here, he turns his hand to a comedy-mystery about sheep, starring Hugh Jackman and Emma Thompson. Adapted from a novel by Leonie Swann.KokuhoOut now Two-time Japan Academy film prize best director winner Lee Sang-il directs this prestige adaptation of Shuichi Yoshida’s novel. It holds the record for the highest-grossing Japanese live-action release ever in Japan – an impressive feat for a nearly three-hour-long period drama set across five decades in the kabuki theatre world

Historic Oxford cinema under threat as Oriel College refuses to extend lease

The survival of one of the UK’s oldest independent cinemas is under threat while its landlord, the University of Oxford’s Oriel College, refuses to extend its lease to allow what its director says are vital renovations.The Ultimate Picture Palace in east Oxford opened in 1911, and has entertained generations of students and residents, including the Oscar-winning director Sam Mendes. It sells tickets for its 106 seats through an old-fashioned box office window to patrons queueing on the street, and its screen is behind a manually opened curtain.After decades of instability, the UPP, as it is known by locals, recently became a community-owned business when more than 1,200 supporters raised funds to keep the cinema operating in the Grade II-listed building.But plans to secure its long-term future have been dashed by Oriel College’s reluctance to approve an extension that would allow further investments and renovations to take place

Arthur Miller opens up about marriage to Marilyn Monroe in newly unearthed recordings

He was one of the greatest playwrights of the 20th century and she was one of the greatest actors. In newly unearthed recordings made over a period of nearly three decades, Arthur Miller opened up about his short-lived marriage to Marilyn Monroe, saying she wanted a husband who was a “father, lover, friend and agent,” and the child she longed for would have been an “additional problem”.In taped conversations with his friend and biographer Prof Christopher Bigsby, Miller said he had felt “death was always on her [Monroe’s] shoulder – always”. He had believed that if he did not “take care of her life” she would come to a “catastrophic end”.“One time I brought doctors to pump her out because she had swallowed enough stuff [drugs] to kill her,” he said

Man charged over bomb hoax after Peter Kay show evacuated

A man has been charged over a bomb hoax after a live show by comedian Peter Kay in Birmingham was stopped when a “potentially suspicious bag” was found around the venue.The Utilita Arena Birmingham was evacuated and a 19-year-old man was taken into custody, West Midlands police said on Friday evening.On Saturday, the force said: “A man has been charged in connection with the events which led to the evacuation of the Utilita Arena in Birmingham last night.“Omar Majed, 19, has been charged with false communications relating to a bomb hoax,” a police spokesperson said. “Majed, of Washwood Heath, Birmingham, has been remanded to appear before magistrates in Birmingham on 4 May

Royal Opera House calls for release of Georgian bass singer jailed over democracy protests

The Royal Opera House in London has urged Keir Starmer to intervene in the case of Paata Burchuladze, a world-renowned bass singer who has been imprisoned in Georgia since October on a charge of leading a coup against the country’s authoritarian leader.The 71-year-old has performed at the Royal Opera House and the Metropolitan Opera House in New York and collaborated with the likes of Luciano Pavarotti, Plácido Domingo and José Carreras. He was arrested after joining a protest outside the presidential palace in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. Last week he was given a seven-year jail sentence which Burchuladze suggested to the court was equivalent to a life sentence given his age.Burchuladze became a rallying figure at nightly demonstrations against the government’s perceived pivot away from the west last autumn

‘Tisio peint? Or: Do you fancy a pint? | Letters

I was delighted to read Phil Coughlin’s nostalgic account of Spike Milligan’s border-straddling pub in Puckoon (Letters, 1 May).But, here in Wales, we have the real thing in the little village of Llanymynech in Powys, where the border between two nations goes through the Bradford Arms hotel. Sunday drinking was illegal in Wales until 1961, so customers would crowd into the private bar, which, being to the east of the border, was not under Welsh drinking laws. For the rest of the week, most customers were more comfortable in the public bar, on the west side of the border.Nowadays you can drink in whichever bar you like, and no, people will not start speaking Welsh the moment you go in

The Parallax View: remember when Hollywood made potent political cinema?

Watching Hollywood cinema in 2026 can make for a curious experience. Take a look out the window and you’ll notice that the US, and indeed the world, is in a polycrisis – though you’d hardly know it from the films at the multiplex. The odd timely picture aside, Hollywood today directly engages with the present moment only rarely; more Minecraft Movie than One Battle After Another.In the 70s, when things were arguably last in a comparably sorry state – Kent State, Vietnam and Watergate for the US, economic crises and violent acts of world revolution globally – popular cinema responded very differently. Out of the establishment-sceptical New Hollywood that emerged after the demise of the Hays code, there came a wave of confronting social and political dramas, strongly allegorical sci-fi and paranoid thrillers, including one of the most deliriously entertaining examples of the latter ever made: The Parallax View

‘We have to mock the site’s insanity’: comedian Tim Heidecker on the allure of becoming Infowars’ new boss

If you’ve tuned in to Infowars over the years, you might have heard a very angry man screaming about the 2020 election being stolen for “reanimated corpse” Joe Biden, or chemicals in the water turning frogs gay, or the Sandy Hook school shooting, which killed 20 children and six staff members, being faked. Founded in 1999, Alex Jones’s Infowars has long been a platform for toxic conspiracy theories with real-life consequences, in addition to weird dietary supplements. But if the Onion has its way, the InfoWars of the future will have a very different impact.The satirical newspaper has been working for several years to take over the site, amid legal battles over Jones’s false claims about the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting. Pending a Texas court’s approval, the platform could soon be in the hands of the Onion and a newly installed creative director, comedian Tim Heidecker, known for his surreal sketches and mockery of the far right

‘Using his Terminator voice, Arnie said: “Your song. Give it to me. Now”’: Bad to the Bone’s creation – and aftermath

Before Bad to the Bone, we just played obscure blues songs from the archives. But when we toured with the Rolling Stones, I noticed the reaction to their Start Me Up. I said: “Man, we’d better hurry up and write an original song with a catchy intro or, five years from now, people will go, ‘Oh yeah, George Thorogood – wasn’t he good at playing Chuck Berry or something?’”Bad to the Bone is a male fantasy. Let’s face it: every guy wants to be bad. We were raised on Hollywood movies and all those tough guys, like Bernardo from West Side Story, or Howlin’ Wolf – we opened for him in 1974 and he had a ferocious reputation