By: Steve Dinneen

Life&Style Editor I'm the editor of City A.M. The Magazine, and editor of the daily newspaper's Life&Style section. We cover food, wine, going out, culture, technology and travel. I'm also the head judge of our Toast the City awards that celebrates hospitality in the Square Mile. Find me on X @steve_dinneen

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Going off grid: How I spent a week living in an ‘apocalypse dome’

May 30, 2017

The more we learn about the effects of social media on the human psyche, the worse it seems to get. The planet is hooked on dopamine squirts triggered by clever algorithms developed by the world’s finest minds, for the sole purpose of keeping us scrolling. And scrolling, and scrolling. We’re connected to thousands of other humans from the second we wake to the [...]
The Treatment review: A darkly satirical take on the movie business and its players

May 5, 2017

The Treatment is a work of lofty, detached genius, reminiscent of the jostling intellectualism of Martin Amis – it's dense, complex, and utterly assured of its own brilliance. On face value, it’s about how the media – in this case, the film industry – edits and rewrites “truth” until it’s at best a distant cousin [...]
Get Out film review: A brilliant scary movie where casual racism is the unseen terror

March 16, 2017

In this Stepford Wives-style horror the unseen terror is casual racism and the insidious force is cultural whitewashing. And while that premise could easily descend into a liberal jumble of earnest back-slapping, Get Out is smart enough to balance its message with a wicked comic streak and some serious horror nous. It follows a young [...]
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? at the Harold Pinter Theatre review: Imelda Staunton is sublime in this vicious, heartbreaking drama

March 16, 2017

Imelda Staunton is the furiously palpitating heart of this intoxicating – not to mention intoxicated – production of Edward Albee’s brilliant treatise on mid-life alcoholism. Often portrayed as a seductive Mrs Robinson figure, Staunton’s Martha is sexuality’s terrifying sunset, refusing to go gentle into that good night. Her conquest of the young academic Nick is [...]
Nier: Automata review: a thrilling, endearing, unhinged sequel to the cult classic from Yoko Taro

March 15, 2017

While big-budget western game franchises often stand accused of design-by-focus-group, their Japanese counterparts are still dominated by mercurial auteurs with singular – and often bizarre – visions. Legendary figures such as Nintendo designer Shigeru Miyamoto, Dark Souls’ Hidetaka Miyazaki, Metal Gear Solid’s Hideo Kojima and Silent Hill’s Keiichiro Toyama are inextricably linked with the blockbuster [...]
Limehouse at Donmar review: SDP drama is an invigorating take-down of Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour

March 10, 2017

"The Labour Party is fucked” is the axiomatic opening line of Steve Waters’ rousing new play. The year is 1981 and the location is the Limehouse kitchen in which the so-called “gang of four” Labour big beasts plotted the formation of the breakaway SDP. The parallels with Jeremy Corbyn’s party are dishearteningly clear. As now, [...]
Ugly Lies the Bone at the National Theatre review: War vet VR drama a rare flop for the NT

March 3, 2017

A perfect storm of poor acting, casting, script and execution beats all life from this under-powered story about a soldier dealing with the mental and physical effects of war. Jess returns home horribly scarred and in chronic pain, barely able to move her twisted body. In a bid to regain her lost freedom she embarks on a form [...]
Hamlet at the Almeida: Sherlock star Andrew Scott brings a twitchy charm to the Danish prince

March 3, 2017

King Lear has overtaken Hamlet as the most performed of the Bard’s work, but this outstanding production shows why the Danish prince is still king. The setting is thoroughly contemporary. Hamlet’s world of mid-century modern furniture and 24-hour news is seamlessly woven into the text; if you were watching the play for the first time [...]
Kong: Skull Island review: The daddy of all monster movies reimagined as a Vietnam war film

March 3, 2017

Kong: Skull Island takes the daddy of all monster movies and reimagines it as a Vietnam war drama. Set in 1973, references to Apocalypse Now are thrown around so liberally it makes you wonder if director Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ (whose only previous feature film is the coming-of-age indie film The Kings of Summer) wanted to make [...]
Eduardo Paolozzi Whitechapel Gallery: artist’s technophobia is a mirror for millennial fear

February 17, 2017

Even if you don’t know the name Eduardo Paolozzi, you’ll be aware of his work: he’s the man behind the brightly-coloured mosaics at Tottenham Court Road underground station. These vibrant, energetic works – saxophones and commuters and abstract spheres – belie a man whose artistic life is perhaps best summed up as a prolonged existential [...]

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By: Steve Dinneen

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