Now that you can’t go out you need to know what to do when you are staying in.
Yes there is a lot of good stuff on the internet and on TV but here we are to help you sort the wheat from the chaff.
If you are lucky enough to have Netflix, Apple TV and Amazon Prime, they are very good entertainment services, but difficult to navigate unless you know what you are looking for.
So here are some tips about various sources of entertainment and what we have found in the last week or so that we can really recommend:
Comedy – The Stand and Gilded Balloon are both doing virtual comedy. It is really hard for the comedians who desperately work for laughs from an audience – and of course they are working to a computer or phone screen instead. But it kind of works and we are sure it will continue to get more normal as the weeks roll on.
The Stand stream their show live on Facebook here on Saturdays at 8pm and you can watch again on YouTube. 22,000 people have watched Saturday night’s show already.
Musicals – Andrew Lloyd Webber has set up a YouTube channel here and will be screening a new musical every Friday. So far Jesus Christ Superstar and Joseph and The Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat are on the channel. So get dressed up and stay in!
If opera is your thing then the Met in New York are streaming nightly performances. It probably means you either need to stay up late and begin watching just around midnight or you have to get yourselves organised to watch during the following day.
A different encore presentation from the company’s Live in HD series is streamed for free on the Met website, with each performance available for a period of 23 hours, from 7:30 p.m. EDT until 6:30 p.m. the following day.
The schedule will include complete performances from the past 14 years of cinema transmissions, starring many of the world’s greatest singers.
The streams are also available through the Met Opera on Demand apps for Apple, Amazon, and Roku devices and Samsung Smart TV. To access them without logging in, click “Browse and Preview” in the apps for connected TV, and “Explore the App” on tablets and mobile devices.
Journalist and broadcaster Lesley Riddoch has collaborated with Charlie Stuart composer Patrick Doyle and his team, trail-maker Chris Smith and funder Chris Weir to create a half hour film to celebrate the 700 years since the Declaration of Arbroath was signed in 1320.
Ms Riddoch says she is trying to plug the gap left by coronavirus which has meant the cancellation of all celebrations in Arbroath itself. She also points out that no UK broadcasters have scheduled any significant TV coverage, although Billy Kay has produced a three part series for BBC Scotland which you will find here.
You can watch the film below and it features Golden Globe winning actor Brian Cox who was supposed to be Grand Marshal at the New York City Tartan Day Parade on Saturday 4 April 2020. They are going to have a virtual Tartan Day instead on 6 April. You will see some of that on their Facebook page. The Declaration of Arbroath forms a central part of the celebrations in Bryant Park in the days leading up to the parade.
The Declaration of Arbroath from Charlie Stuart on Vimeo.
Since we are all at home and having to cook more, unless you use one of our Edinburgh home delivery services, you might be interested in this Netflix series which has had six seasons so far, perhaps without some of you even noticing.
Chef’s Table is filmed in HDR and features chefs from all over the world.
- Mashama Bailey returns to Georgia, her place of birth, to open a new restaurant drawing on the knowledge and culinary history of the Southern African American chefs who came before her.
- Aspiring veterinarian Dario Ceccini returns to save his family’s butchery business and becomes the world’s most famous butcher.
- Asma Khan abandons a career in British constitutional law to return to India to extract the secret recipes of her family’s Royal Muglai roots.
- Sean Brock, who has devoted his career to preserving southern food crops and culinary traditions, is finally forced to reckon with personal demons that threaten his life
There are already three seasons of The Marvelous Mrs Maisel on Amazon Prime UK. A fourth season was commissioned last December, but is possibly still at the production stage, and who knows when it will see the light of day.
Rachel Brosnahan is stylish, elegant and extremely funny in this award winning comedy as Midge Maisel. You can stream this from Amazon or use the Prime Video app where you usually find it on your mobile, smart TV or other method of watching Prime. Amazon Prime does come with an annual fee, but if you regularly buy from the online site then you can recoup the fee in saved postage over time.
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is the winner of sixteen Emmy Awards including Outstanding Comedy series, three Golden Globes including Best TV Series—Comedy, five Critics’ Choice Awards including Best Comedy Series, two PGA Awards, a WGA Award, and a Peabody Award.
Founding Editor of The Edinburgh Reporter.
Edinburgh-born multimedia journalist and iPhoneographer.
