The SheerLuxe Culture List: June

Three years after his last film The French Dispatch, Wes Anderson brings his signature cinematic styling and deliberate colour palettes back to the big screen in his new film, Asteroid City. The action takes place in a fictional American desert town in 1955. The itinerary of a junior space cadet convention (organised to bring together students and parents from across the country for fellowship and scholarly competition) is spectacularly disrupted by world-changing events. In classic Anderson style, the film features an all-star cast, including (deep breath) Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks, Jeffrey Wright, Tilda Swinton, Bryan Cranston, Edward Norton, Adrien Brody, Liev Schreiber, Hope Davis, Stephen Park, Rupert Friend, Maya Hawke, Steve Carell, Matt Dillon, Hong Chau, Willem Dafoe, Margot Robbie, Tony Revolori, Jake Ryan and Jeff Goldblum.

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The Idol is one of the most anticipated TV series of the year. The brainchild of Grammy-winning artist The Weeknd (Abel Tesfaye) and the creator of Euphoria, Sam Levison, the series is a sordid, wild love story. The six-episode drama stars Tesfaye as Tedros, a self-help guru, alongside Lily-Rose Depp who plays Jocelyn, an up-and-coming pop idol and Tedros's love interest. Set against the backdrop of Hollywood’s music industry, we follow Jocelyn as she tries to reclaim her title as the sexiest pop star in America, all while exploring her challenging relationship with a corrupt club owner and leader of a contemporary cult.

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The Crowded Room is a gripping ten-episode series starring Tom Holland. It follows Danny Sullivan (Holland), who is arrested following his involvement in a shooting in New York City in 1979. Through a series of interviews with curious interrogator Rya Goodwin (Amanda Seyfried), Danny’s life story unfolds, revealing elements of the mysterious past that shaped him, and the twists and turns that will lead him to a life-altering revelation.

Visit TV.Apple.com

From the Valleys to the nightclubs of Cardiff, London and Manchester, Neon Roses is a funny, heart-warming, queer coming-of-age story with a cracking 80s soundtrack, from an exciting new voice in Welsh fiction. Eluned Hughes is stuck. It's 1984 in a valley in south Wales: the miners' strike is ravaging her community; her sister's swanned off with a Thatcherite policeman; and her boyfriend Lloyd keeps bringing up marriage. Then the fundraising group Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners comes down from London, and she meets June, a snaggle-toothed blonde in a too-big leather jacket. Suddenly, Eluned isn't stuck any more – she's in freefall. With June, Eluned can imagine a completely different – and exciting – life for herself. But as her family struggles with the strike, and her relationship with her sister deteriorates, should she really leave it all behind?

Visit Amazon.co.uk

In the shared and private spaces of Iowa City, a loose circle of lovers and friends encounter, confront and provoke one another in a volatile year of self-discovery. At the group’s centre are Ivan, a dancer turned aspiring banker who dabbles in amateur pornography; Fatima, whose independence and work ethic complicate her relationships with friends and a trusted mentor; and Noah, who ‘didn’t seek sex out so much as it came up to him like an anxious dog in need of affection’. These three are buffeted by a cast of poets, artists, landlords, meat-packing workers and mathematicians who populate the cafés, classrooms and foodservice kitchens of the city, sometimes to violent and electrifying consequence. As everyone prepares for an uncertain future, the group heads to a cabin to bid goodbye to their former lives – a moment of reckoning that leaves them all altered forever.

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Watch Us Dance combines the youth, vibrancy and allure of Call Me By Your Name with the historical fiction force of Great Circle and the sense of place and time of The Lost Daughter. Morocco, 1968. As she stands at the window, Mathilde reflects on the opportunities before her, and all she has achieved. Looking out at her elegant, expensive garden, anything feels possible, and she is determined to celebrate it. Don’t they have the right to enjoy life, after dedicating their best years to the war and then to this farm? Mathilde is blissfully unaware of what a new chapter of Moroccan history means for her family, the country and its future. Her babies are now grown up, and they are all about to learn that life can take wild and unexpected turns.

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Powerfully sensual and stylish, Mrs S is a tale of queer love from one of Granta’s 2023 Best Young Novelists. In an elite English boarding school where the girls kiss the marble statue of the famous dead author who used to walk the halls, a young Australian woman arrives to take up the antiquated role of 'matron'. Within this landscape of immense privilege, in which the girls can sense the slightest weakness in those around them, she finds herself unsure of her role, her accent and her body. That is until she meets Mrs S, the headmaster's wife, a woman who is her opposite: assured, sophisticated, a paragon of femininity. Over the course of a long, restless heatwave, the matron finds herself irresistibly drawn ever closer into Mrs S's world and their unspoken desire blooms into an illicit affair of electric intensity. But, as the summer begins to fade, both women know that a choice must be made.

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Ahead of the cinematic release of Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City on 23rd June, Universal Pictures and 180 Studios are bringing an accompanying exhibition to life. The event comprises original sets, props, miniatures, costumes and artwork featured in the film. The immersive exhibition will transport audiences into the world of Anderson’s eleventh feature film, through installations displaying signature visuals and sounds, as well as an opportunity to dine out at the film’s iconic 1950s diner, the Luncheonette.

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From the opera goddesses of the Victorian era to today’s global megastars, Diva will celebrate the power and creativity of iconic performers, exploring what it means to be a diva and how this has been subverted or embraced over time across opera, stage, popular music, and film. Featuring fashion, photography, design, costumes, music and live performance drawn from the V&A collection and loans from across the world, the exhibition looks at how the performer has flourished – and sometimes vilified – with society and driven change through their voice and art.

Visit VAM.ac.uk

Martin McDonagh recently won the Best British Film Bafta for The Banshees of Inisherin. Now the man behind Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, In Bruges and Seven Psychopaths is putting on the savagely funny Olivier award-winning The Pillowman by Helen Murray at Duke of York’s theatre from 12th June. Lily Allen will play Katurian, a writer in a police state who is interrogated about the content of her short stories and their similarities to several murders occurring in the town.  Inside Number 9’s Steve Pemberton plays Tupolski, with Paul Kaye as Ariel and Matthew Tennyson as Michal.

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Michael R. Jackson’s critically acclaimed Broadway sensation A Strange Loop is transferring to the Barbican Theatre this summer for a one-time-only 12-week season. Winner of every best musical award in New York, including the Pulitzer, this hilarious musical opens on 17th June. The blisteringly funny masterwork exposes the heart and soul of Usher – a young, gay, Black writer who hates his day job, so writes a musical about a young, gay, Black writer who is writing a musical about a young, gay, Black writer… a strange loop indeed. Usher grapples with desires, identity and instincts he both loves and loathes, all brought to life on stage by a hilarious, straight-talking ensemble.

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