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Seek out a delicious shellfish supper on Regent's Canal, get hot under the collar listening to the sweet sounds of Miguel, or shake off the cobwebs and dance in the dawn at Morning Gloryville. Have an awesome week with the suggestions below.
Things to do
Monty Python and the Holy Grail 40th Anniversary, various locations, Wed. For one night only a brand new sing-a-long version of the 1975 comedy classic will be released in over 500 UK cinemas simultaneously. The screenings will be accompanied by a specially filmed intro from Terry Jones, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin, Eric Idle and John Cleese.
Knitting Kittens Club, Battersea Dogs & Cats Home, Wed, free. Cat-lovers are the butt of some pretty unfortunate stereotyping on occasion, so it's nice to see an event that caters to their interests, even if assuming they love knitting is stereotyping, too. But if you do love cats and knitting, or love cats and would like to start knitting, this is the club for you.
Apsley House Twilight Tours, Apsley House, Wed. Torch-lit tours of the Duke of Wellington's regency home take place at twilight every Wednesday in October, with the chance to see his impressive art collection which includes works by Velazquez and Rubens.
Stylist Live, Business Design Centre, Thu, £25. Edith Bowman and Dawn O'Porter host this four-day festival curated by Stylist magazine. There'll be Q&As and appearances by the likes of Caitlin Moran, Nigella Lawson, Salman Rushdie and Yotam Ottolenghi.
New Ideas for Housing, New London Architecture, Thu, free. Following the success of a spring exhibition exploring the massive boom in skyscraper construction, this fresh investigation by New London Architecture looks at the capital's housing crisis.
Tim Hunkin and his Nuclear Reactor, Novelty Automation, Thu, free. A late-night opening and talk at one of our favourite London eccentricities: Novelty Automation. Visitors will be able stay and play late on inventor Tim Hunkin's clever creations.
The Art of Nuisance, HQ, all week, prices vary. Two weeks of art interventions, workshops and gatherings celebrating feminist activism. Organised by The Sisters of Perpetual Resistance, the fortnight opens with a show by five emerging artists featuring sonic and anarchist art.
…or check out more events happening in London this week.
Eating and drinking
London Shell Co., various locations, Wed-Thu, £50. A five-course seafood feast served up on a floating wide beam Norfolk cruiser? This is the sort of classy night out that's normally reserved for people with second homes in the countryside, and yet London Shell Co. are making it happen on the serene Regent's Canal right here in London.
Club Lola, secret London location, Wed, £25. This new supperclub offers a casual, friendly evening of excellent food at Lola's home in Brixton.
North vs South Real Ale Festival, The Snooty Fox, Thu, free. Does the North of England brew better beers than the South? We couldn't possibly make a call without trying a few, and the Snooty Fox will be laying on a special selection at this ale festival, with breweries such as Revolutions Brewing Co (Yorkshire), Franklins (Sussex) and Big Smoke (London) fighting their respective corners.
The Unconventional Dinner, Secret London location, all week, £45. Forget the forks and put both elbows firmly on the table at this supperclub which asks you to leave social conventions at the door.
…or check out the latest restaurant reviews.
Comedy
Jessie Cave: I Loved Her, Soho Theatre, £10-£12.50. Jessie Cave – who 'Harry Potter' fans might recognise as Lavender Brown in the films – lays bare her insecurities (and social media stalking) in her new show, 'I Loved Her'.
Kieran Hodgson – Lance, Soho Theatre, Tue-Thu, £15, £10 concs. A beautifully written hour, with Hodgson focusing on his teenage hero Lance Armstrong who helps the Yorkshire lad through the tough times of mountain bike races and going to university.
Joseph Morpurgo: Soothing Sounds for Baby, The Invisible Dot Ltd, all week, £9-£12. 'Soothing Sounds for Baby' is both retro and cutting edge. The set up is a faux episode of 'Desert Island Discs' (featuring dialogue from Kirsty Young painstakingly spliced together for actual episodes) and Morpurgo transforms into the characters on the sleeves of his chosen vinyls.
…or check out all the critics’ choice comedy shows.
Live music
Miguel, O2 Academy Brixton, Tue, £30.50. If you’ve lost your libido, forget Viagra and shell out instead on a ticket for this big London date with US R&B superstar Miguel.
Leftfield, Roundhouse, Tue, £32. Following the release of ‘Alternative Light Source’ – their first released an LP of original material since 1999 – Leftfield are back to play the new stuff and awesome oldies like ‘Phat Planet’ and the trance-tastic ‘Shallow Grave’.
Venice: Darkness to Light, Southwark Cathedral, Wed, £5-£25. City of London Sinfonia under Stephen Layton explores the sounds of La Serenissima, from JS Bach’s take on two of the watery city’s most musical sons – Pergolesi’s ‘Stabat Mater’ and a keyboard concerto based on Vivaldi.
CocoRosie, Village Underground, Wed, £20. American sisters Sierra and Bianca Casady spin a kooky, delicate, divinely alternative world that embraces opera, fractured blues, electronica, avant-folk and found sounds from children's toys.
Jamie XX, O2 Academy Brixton, Thu, £20.50. The XX’s beatmaker-general crafts nostalgic, floor-filling rave tunes at a live AV show.
…or take a look at all the live music events in London this week.
© Alice Peperell
Nightlife
Morning Gloryville, Ministry of Sound, Tue. A pre-work mid-week fitness rave, which aims to give punters a healthy, start to the working day via snacks, massages and a lot of dancing.
IOU, Red Gallery, Thu, £10-£20. East London flexes its creative muscles for two nights during Frieze week, with underground musicians including Bo Ningen, No Bra and Wild Daughter plus artists, speakers, DJs and filmmakers all descending on Red Gallery for two nights of music and performance.
Hip Hop Karaoke, The Social, Thu, £5-£7 adv, MOTD. Think you can rap? Prove it at this popular karaoke night, where you can flex your rhyming muscles to your favourite hip hop cuts from over the decades.
Your Mum's House, The Nest, Thu, £7, £5 before midnight. Not for the faint-hearted, this weekly jaunt is a 'dress up 'n' get messed up' night of mayhem and mischief, with a soundtrack of bassy house, hip hop, old school bangers, trap, R&B and UK garage.
…or see all the parties planned this week.
Suffragette
Film
Scanners, Prince Charles Cinema, TONIGHT, £7.50, £5 concs. David Cronenberg's breakthrough film follows a small group of 'scanners', or warrior-telepaths, fighting off a sinister mind-war army that is backed, indirectly, by industry and the state.
BFI London Film Festival: ‘Our Man in Havana’, BFI Southbank, TONIGHT, £9.05–£14.05. The London Film Festival doesn’t just screen the biggest, newest films – though there are loads of those. For the discerning, old-school cineaste there’s also a fistful of classic movies, rediscovered and remastered for a new audience.
Science on Screen, Barbican Centre, Tue, £9.50 + booking fee. This series of bi-monthly screenings celebrates the connections that can be made between science and film, inviting notable figures to explore with audiences how scientific perspectives can shed light on artistic cultural and social issues.
Or at the cinema...
Suffragette ★★★★☆ Nearly 100 years after smashing shop windows and blowing up letterboxes, the British suffragettes finally get a film they deserve. And thank god it’s not a pretty-pretty sugarcoated period drama.
Pan ★★★★☆ Joe Wright's family-adventure spin on JM Barrie's stories imagines with grand invention how and why Peter Pan became the boy he did.
…or see all of the latest releases.
Theatre
Consensual, Ambassadors Theatre, Tue-Wed, £27.50, £17.50 concs. The NYT plays a blinder with this slippery play about underage consent.
Measure for Measure, Young Vic, all week, £10-£35. Romala Garai shines in a splendidly smutty Shakespeare that's not for the easily offended.
Teddy Ferrara, Donmar Warehouse, all week, £10-£37.50. Dominic Cooke returns to theatre to direct this messy but insightful play about gay American students.
Barbarians, Central St Martins School of Art, all week, £10-£32. Tooting Arts Club's searing revival of Barrie Keefe's brutal late '70s play returns.
…or see our theatre critics’ choices.
This week's best new art
The Hyundai Commission: Abraham Cruzvillegas, Tate Modern, Tue-Thu, free. The first Hyundai Commission will transform Tate Modern's monumental Turbine Hall in a most unexpected way.
Zhang Ding, ICA, £1, Tue-Thu, Day membership; free on Tue & concs. Shanghai-based Zhang Ding will transform the ICA's theatre with two music stages where bands will play in unison.
The Amazing World of MC Escher, Dulwich Picture Gallery, Wed-Thu, free. Having busted the block with its summer show of Eric Ravilious, Dulwich Picture Gallery looks set to have another hit on its hands with this survey of the Dutch graphic artist Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898–1972).
Lee Miller: A Woman's War, Imperial War Museum, daily, £10, £5-£7 concs. More than 150 images by the important photographer, taken before, during and immediately after WWII.
Giacometti: Pure Presence, National Portrait Gallery, daily, £15, £13.50 concs. The first ever show to focus on a less well-known aspect of the modernist sculptor's career.
Art is Your Human Right: The Artistic Campaigns of Bob and Roberta Smith, William Morris Gallery, Wed-Sun, free. Patrick Brill, aka Bob and Roberta Smith, showcases his polemical artworks about the democratic importance of art.
Running Naked, TJ Boulting, Tue-Sat, free. A collaborative exhibition between the Paris-based duo, assume vivid astro focus, recent Royal College of Art graduate Cibelle Cavalli Bastos and Shoplifter aka a.k.a. Hrafnhildur Arnardottir.
States of Mind: Anne Veronica Janssens, Wellcome Collection, Tue-Sun, free. The Wellcome Collection launches its yearlong exploration of human consciousness with a new installation by Ann Veronica Janssens titled ‘yellowbluepink’.
Frieze London and Frieze Masters, Regent's Park, Weds-Sat, from £16. The mighty Frieze London and Frieze Masters art fairs have reigned over the London art calendar for years. This October, both fairs are set up again in Regent's Park.
And for even more art fairs in London this week, check out the Sunday Art Fair, The Other Art Fair, Moniker Art Fair, 1:54 Contemporary African Art Fair and Pavilion of Art & Design London.
…or see more of this week's best new art.
And finally
Win... a two night stay at a boutique hotel with breakfasst, dinner and champagne or a luxury escape in SW1
Grab... £6.90 tickets to The Chocolate Show at Olympia National Hall
Book… these gigs while you still can
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