Volcano: Noël Coward's Caribbean Play

VOLCANO: As a rare Noël Coward play is exhumed, his biographer explains its genesis in Jamaica

As a rare play is exhumed, the playwright's biographer explains its genesis in Jamaica

Volcano was written in 1956 when Noël Coward was suffering the dubious status of having become Britain’s first celebrity tax exile.  The play – unperformed in his lifetime - is the product of his laidback life in Jamaica, and of a period during which he was regarded as a crumbling colonial relic outmoded by a post-war Labour government and the rowdy commotions of the Angry Young Men back home.

Vincente Minnelli: Celebrating Mr Hollywood

VINCENTE MINNELLI - CELEBRATING MR HOLLYWOOD: The king of Forties and Fifties film glamour is the subject of a major new season at the BFI

The king of Forties and Fifties film glamour is the subject of a major new season at the BFI

For most film buffs, the name of director Vincente Minnelli immediately recalls the quintessence of the MGM musical of the 1940s and 1950s - a world of fantasy, brilliant colours, stylish décor and costumes in which Fred Astaire, Judy Garland, Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron dance and sing. The name also evokes steamy dramas and civilised comedies such as Some Came Running and Father of the Bride. As the BFI launches a major season of his films this week, however, it's worth pondering whether there is more to his oeuvre than meets the eye.

Lygia Pape: Magnetised Space, Serpentine Gallery

LYGIA PAPE: Brazilian artist receives deserved recognition seven years after her death

Brazilian artist receives deserved recognition seven years after her death

The Serpentine’s north gallery has been transformed into a magical space (main picture). Strung from floor to ceiling of the darkened room, shafts of copper wire glimmer in subdued lighting like sunbeams, or the searchlights that scanned the night sky for enemy aircraft during World War Two.

The Comic Strip Presents: The Hunt for Tony Blair, Channel 4

THE HUNT FOR TONY BLAIR: Vintage comedy ensemble returns with the Comic Strip's Hitchcockian fugitive caper 

Vintage comedy ensemble returns with Hitchcockian fugitive caper

As this rampant return to our screens repeatedly underlined, one of the great joys of watching The Comic Strip throughout its 30-year frenzy of frantic - if intermittent - silliness has been never knowing what precise manifestation of oddness lurks around each corner. Where else, after all, would you find "Babs" Windsor popping up – utterly gratuitously – to give Tony Blair a meaty snog? Or Ross Noble ambling into frame as a socialist tramp, shortly to be throttled and thrown from a moving train?

Grief, National Theatre

GRIEF: The new play by national treasure Mike Leigh is uncompromisingly bleak

The new play by national treasure Mike Leigh is uncompromisingly bleak

A new play by Mike Leigh is always an event. So there was a palpable excitement in the air at the Cottesloe Theatre (the smallest and most intimate of the three National Theatre auditoria) when his latest opened last night.