Space Force: Astronomically good TV

BBC Culture picks this week’s best TV, film, theatre and art.

New film – The Lighthouse

It might have been tough to be stuck at home these past few weeks, but it could be some comfort to watch two characters stranded on a remote island off the coast of New England in The Lighthouse. Robert Pattinson plays a trainee lighthouse keeper with no one for company except a tyrannical old salt (Willem Dafoe), a vindictive seagull, and a mermaid who could well be a figment of his imagination. His ordeal keeps getting weirder and weirder throughout Robert Eggers’ delirious black-and-white historical horror comedy, one of the most adventurous films of recent years. As Pattinson explained to BBC Culture, The Lighthouse came about because he told Eggers that he wanted to collaborate on something “really, really, really crazy”. Eggers replied: “I’ve been writing this thing with my brother, and if this isn’t crazy enough, I don’t know what is!” Available on iTunes. (NB)

New TV – Space Force

Netflix’s newest cosmic comedy brings together a stellar cast. Space Force stars Steve Carrell as General Mark R Naird, Chief of Space Operations, John Malkovich as a Dr Strangelove-esque scientific advisor, and Ben Schwartz as Social Media Director. Naird is pulled between the responsibilities of putting “boots on the moon” and fathering a teenage daughter all alone while his wife, Lisa Kudrow, is in prison. Created by Carrell alongside Greg Daniels, writer of The Office, Space Force is one of the most astronomically good shows Netflix has released during lockdown. (LW)

Art – Compassion; Pope Francis as Homeless

Artists are making the invisible visible during this crisis: for the next week, Chris Levine and Jealous Gallery are raising money for the UK’s Trussell Trust with a limited edition print. Until 7 June, a new portrait of the Dalai Lama, #compassion (pictured), is available for £250 – with all profits going to the anti-poverty charity, which has a network of 1200 food banks nationwide. Meanwhile, with a street art series, Pope Francis as Homeless, Milanese artist aleXsandro Palombo addresses themes of poverty and solidarity, reflecting on the social side of a pandemic that is making millions of people around the world poorer. (FM)

Film Festival – We Are One

With physical film festivals on hold, YouTube and Tribeca Enterprises created We Are One: A Global Film Festival, a free, streaming extravaganza with an international flavour. The grab-bag line-up –  curated by 21 festivals from Cannes to Mumbai – offers fiction, documentary and animation, mostly recent films. Among the promising discoveries is the socially-minded farce Eeb Allay Ooo! (pictured), whose hero works chasing monkeys from New Delhi's government buildings. Amreeka, unavailable to stream elsewhere, is a 2009 gem about a Palestinian family in Middle America. Added attractions include talks with Bong Joon Ho and Francis Ford Coppola, and a DJ set from Questlove, 100 options ripe for discovery. 29 May to 7 June. (CJ)

Classic TV – Scrubs

Even the stars of this show have decided lockdown is the best time to revisit Scrubs. Or pick it up fresh, since they barely remember anything 10 years after the series finale. In their new podcast, Fake Doctors Real Friends, Zach Braff and Donald Faison make their way through the show’s eight-season run, revisiting each episode individually and recalling what little they can about their experience filming it. Any other time, the massive aura of this comedy and its cult following would have made it seem like a daunting task to take up, but there is no better time to get stuck in the lives of this ragtag team of medical interns now that the show is available in its entirety on All 4 and Hulu. (LW)

Design – Kimono

Just two weeks into its run, the acclaimed Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk exhibition was closed. Fortunately for fans of fashion and Japanese culture, the Victoria & Albert Museum has now made this show accessible once more. A series of five films takes the viewers on a behind-the-scenes tour, with curator Anna Jackson guiding us through the exhibition spaces, and providing an intimate insight into the making of the show. The kimono, arguably the ultimate symbol of Japan, has a fascinating history. But although it is a garment often viewed as traditional and timeless, the kimono is in fact a constantly evolving and dynamic icon of fashion. Social and sartorial significance are explored in the 30-minute films, along with its extraordinary reinvention by a new wave of contemporary designers and stylists. (LB)

Classic film – Duck Soup (1933)

In the Marx Brothers’ finest hour-and-a-bit, Groucho stars as Rufus T Firefly, a wise-cracking chancer who is installed as the leader of the fairy-tale state of Freedonia. (“If you think this country’s bad now, just wait ‘til I get through with it.”) Harpo and Chico are the idiotic spies sent from neighbouring Sylvania to steal his plans, and generally to annoy everyone they meet. What makes Duck Soup unique is that the palatial sets, lavish costumes and glamorous supporting actors belong in a grand historical romance. But Groucho and co behave as if they are romping around the roughest of vaudeville theatres. Scruffy, violent, fast-talking, and wild, they’re a whirlwind of pure anarchy. The political satire may be sharp, but the lunatic slapstick and rat-a-tat insults are what makes Duck Soup an invaluable distraction from today’s worries. Available via Google, Chili, BFIPlayer, and YouTube. (NB)

Theatre – Thespie

It’s fantastic how, in the last couple of months, the theatre industry has kept on keeping on by pivoting online and providing the world with countless digital productions to be enjoyed at home. But how to choose from the hundreds of viewing options out there? New platform Thespie is a great helping hand – with it, you can search for what to watch by, among other things, genre, mood, and format, from a whole range of archive filmed shows (such as This House, pictured above, the latest offering in the National Theatre’s At Home series), new work, artists’ talks and workshops. (HM)

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