Jane Schoenbrun’s third feature, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, is out now, and the week’s entertainment slate keeps doing what culture under capitalism does best: packaging everything from queer horror to orchestral prestige into a marketable circuit of premieres, venues and platforms. The film builds on Schoenbrun’s interest in queer horror and follows the fictional Camp Miasma slasher franchise, which is set to be resurrected by an up-and-coming director played by Hannah Einbinder. That director enters into a wild relationship with the star of the originals, played by Gillian Anderson. The machinery is familiar. New faces, old brands, fresh extraction.
Mutiny is out now. Jason Statham stars in the action thriller as a man framed for the murder of his boss. Annabelle Wallis and Adrian Lester also star. Spa Weekend is out now. Leslie Mann, Isla Fisher, Michelle Buteau and Anna Faris star in the buddy comedy, which follows three childhood BFFs reunited for a fabulous weekend getaway before a former friend, described as a total hot mess, gatecrashes their pampering sesh. Insidious: Out of the Further is out now. It is the sixth instalment in the Insidious franchise, which began in 2010 with a relatively simple haunted-house story. In this latest outing, a young mother discovers she can bring back supernatural demons. The franchise logic never sleeps. It just mutates.
The Culture Industry Keeps Rolling
Rochelle Jordan plays Dublin on 25 August and Manchester on 26 August in support of her third album, Through the Wall. British-born, Canada-raised, she has a five-EP series of remixes slowly being released, and the shows are expected to be head-knocking, sweat-soaked affairs. Tyler, the Creator headlines two dates at Victoria Park, London, on 28 and 29 August at this year’s east London-based All Points East series. The mercurial rapper, singer, actor and fashion designer is expected to bring a zigzagging setlist careening between hip-hop, funk and electro, with support across the two shows from Turnstile, Dijon and Rex Orange County. Big stages. Big ticketing. Same old funnel.
The London Symphony Orchestra/Pappano plays Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Snape, on 28 August. The Proms may be London’s symphonic main stage in August, but one of the capital’s finest orchestras is decamping to East Anglia with Bruckner’s Symphony No 9 and Gubaidulina’s Viola Concerto. Antonio Pappano conducts, with Norwegian violist Eivind Ringstad. Tom Barford Quintet plays Peggy’s Skylight, Nottingham, on 22 August and East Side Jazz Club, London, on 25 August. Tom Barford won the prestigious Kenny Wheeler prize in 2017 for his edgily inviting compositions and is also known for his sax virtuosity. The set is expected to mix Barford originals with tributes to Joe Henderson. Even the jazz circuit comes with its own hierarchy of prestige, prizes and approved routes.
Exhibitions, Identity and the Gallery Circuit
Our Place in These Worlds is at Elizabeth Xi Bauer, London, to 27 September. The roving, constantly evolving exhibition has been growing and touring since 2023 and features work about migration, colonialism and collective identity by Esvin Alarcón Lam, Antonio Pichillá Quiacaín and Simón Vega. Hot Snakes Night Club is at Taco!, London, from 22 August to 13 September. Artist Chloe Langlois is transforming the south-east London gallery into a cabaret club for three weeks of live performances, workshops and experimental music, starting with a 24-hour occult marathon. Gender Stories is at Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, to 31 August. The show includes works by David Hockney, Catherine Opie, Grayson Perry and Zanele Muholi and looks at how art can help figure out the meaning of gender and how it shapes everyday lives.
Simeon Barclay is at John Hansard Gallery, Southampton, to 29 August. The British conceptualist is celebrating his nomination for this year’s Turner prize with an exhibition about barriers, gatekeeping, pop culture, fashion, bus seats and giant inflatable mascots. The title alone sounds like a joke the institutions are in on. The barriers are the point. The gatekeeping is the business model.
Frankie Thompson’s Horrible Things is at Beside at Pleasance Courtyard, Edinburgh, to 30 August. The show sits somewhere between character comedy, performance art and drag, and includes lip-syncing, often to unsettling archive recordings, audience interaction and contemporary clowning. A Slow Fire is at Jermyn Street theatre, London, to 26 September. Simon Stephens’s post-apocalyptic play is the UK premiere and stars a fierce trio of Irish actors, with two men trapped in a bunker before they meet a mysterious stranger. Sauna Sessions Arts Club is at Summerhall, Edinburgh, to 31 August. The Edinburgh festival fringe hosts the UK’s first arts centre set inside a sauna, an 80-seater venue that will host immersive performances including a morning rave, a ritualistic storytelling experience and a reworking of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves, with towel-based choreography. Dan Daw: Exxy is at King’s theatre, Edinburgh, on 23 August. Exxy, Australian slang for expensive, follows the uncompromising and acclaimed Dan Daw Show and sees the queer, disabled dancer and choreographer Daw return, thinking back to his youth as an outsider in working-class South Australia.
Screens, Streams and the Same Old Systems
Fightland streams on Sky Atlantic & Now on 27 August at 9pm. The 50 Cent-produced drama is about the overlap between London’s boxing scene and its criminal underworld. Howard Charles plays a heavyweight champ who returns to the UK to wreak violent revenge on his former promoter, a drug kingpin. The Airport Chaplain is on Netflix on 26 August. The Australian series stars Hugo Weaving and The Pitt’s Shabana Azeez and follows a man who isn’t afraid to ruffle feathers to ensure the smooth running of a busy airport. Dog Park is on U on 24 August. The Australian dramedy follows Roland, whose wife moves abroad and who is left in charge of the family pooch, leading him into the hyper-friendly local dog-walking community. Dark Matter returns on Apple TV on 28 August. Blake Crouch’s sci-fi follows a physicist who split himself in two so he could enjoy family life and a stellar career, with Joel Edgerton reprising the role(s) of Jason Dessen, who has reunited with his wife and child but may be tempted by the multiverse.
Star Wars Zero Company is out on 27 August for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. The single-player tactics game is set during the Clone Wars and has players managing a group of misfits with a range of backgrounds and abilities. Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy is out on 27 August for PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. The prequel stars combat-confident smuggler Sophia, takes place on Minotaur’s Island and returns to ancient Minoan times to learn more about the mysterious Macula. Even the games arrive dressed as choice while keeping players inside carefully designed systems.
Julia Holter’s Materia is out now. After releasing her sixth album Something in the Room She Moves in 2024, the US singer-songwriter turned her focus to its crystalline fourth track, Materia, and on this follow-up reimagines that song not once but twice, while also pushing her sound into new shapes on the tactile My Lost One. Sam Smith’s Hazel Eyes is out now. For their fifth album, the singer-songwriter leans into a more rustic sound, with Oh Mother described as head-spinning gospel and When He’s Gone as delicate and full of longing. Weezer’s Weezer (Gold Album) is out now. It is the band’s 20th album and their seventh self-titled release differentiated by album colour, with production by Swedish pop producer Klas Åhlund and hip-hop wizard Kenny Beats, plus a guest spot from alt-rockers Wednesday. Brandon Flowers’ Thrasher is out now. With Mr Brightside still in the UK Top 100 after more than 500 weeks, the Killers frontman returns with a third solo album that recasts him as a country troubadour after 2015’s The Desired Effect explored perky synthpop.
RA Exchange is a podcast celebrating its 25th anniversary, with Resident Advisor releasing in-depth discussions with leaders of the scene, from house and techno brothers Overmono to UK garage satirists Kurupt FM. Music-map.com is an online site that lets users type in the name of a favourite artist and navigate through a sprawling mind map of related sounds. Assignment: Brazil’s Gambling Addiction is on BBC World Service on 25 August at 9.32am. Journalist Camilla Mota goes in search of why betting has such a stronghold in Brazil and the psychiatrists trying to help, with 2.1 million Brazilians currently reporting an addiction to gambling. The week’s guide ends where the market always likes to end: with another platform, another release, another audience to be sorted, segmented and sold back its own reflection.