Top cultural spots to visit and gifts for the festive season

Nobody wants to jinx it. But there is a chance (whisper it, quietly) that next year may mean the return of live culture to something like normality.

With that in mind, it would be public spirited to encourage friends and family to visit some of the nation's finest places of entertainment. Most offer gift vouchers. Cineastes will appreciate a few euro towards screenings at Queen's Film Theatre in Belfast, the Irish Film Institute in Dublin, The Light House in Dublin and that last venue's sister space, Pálás in Galway. The Stella Cinema in Rathmines was recently named best cinema in Britain and Ireland by Time Out magazine. Press Up Gift Cards will allow the recipient to spend at any of that group's restaurants, bars and hotels, but an accompanying card could, perhaps, point them towards the luxurious seats in the Stella.

Most of the nation’s theatres also offer tokens. Send your egghead pals or your cultured relatives to The Abbey in Dublin, The in Galway, The Lyric in Belfast or any of the other equally excellent theatres that we haven’t space to list here (and to whom we mean no offense). The venues will appreciate the business and your friends may savour the nudge required to get them back into the auditorium.

It would be irresponsible of this article to suggest individual events – by the time you read this all tickets could be gone — but we nonetheless observe that Whitesnake will be gigging with Foreigner at 3Arena on May 10th. That should make some noise. Billie Eilish, pop singer of the moment, is at the same venue on June 4th. The suave will enjoy St Vincent, alter-ego of the endlessly innovative Annie Clark, in Fairview Park on June 26th. If those tickets are sold out from Ticketmaster, well . . . That company can also oblige with vouchers.

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Gift cards to the Netflix or Disney+ streaming services may seem a little impersonal – like offering to pay your loved one's gas bill, but Google Play gift cards, accompanied perhaps by a recommendation, will open up the opportunity to rent older films from one of the best catalogues in the digital marketplace. That is how such things are done these days.

For all the joys of the virtual world and for all the freedom that the voucher allows, there is still a special pleasure in opening up a big box full of goodies. The DVD companies, aware that streaming is eating into the everyday market, now pour more and more effort into lavish reissues. A few fine examples have emerged this year. The 50th anniversary package of Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange is particularly delicious. As well as a lovely new edition of the film itself, the three-disc set – Blu-Ray and 4K Ultra HD – offers documentaries on Kubrick and star Malcolm McDowell. You get a 32-page booklet, a poster, behind-the-scene stills and, as they used to say, plenty, plenty more.

The new collector’s edition of John Carpenter’s The Thing is, if anything, even better appointed. As well as a bunch of video extras on the indestructible 1982 horror, you get a CD of Ennio Morricone’s soundtrack, lobby cards and a booklet that contains excerpts from the script.

Even those two extravagant packages seem everyday when set beside the ornate trunk that now houses David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive. Currently celebrating its 20th anniversary, the film was recently voted best of the century by critics. The lovely box itself – featuring a newly commissioned image of Naomi Watts loomed over by a terrified Laura Harring – is reason enough to fork out the hefty fee, but be assured that extras are again overflowing.

If you are looking for something a little less pricy seek out the newly minted Blu-Rays of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Smiley’s People. Two of the best series ever broadcast by the BBC, the John Le Carré adaptations have been carefully restored for the HD age.

Music reissues also come in increasingly tasty packages. The pick of this year’s might be the collected albums Joni Mitchell released for Reprise Records from 1968 until 1971. The most committed fans will tend towards the expensive vinyl set of four untouchable records – Song to a Seagull, Clouds, Ladies of the Canyon and Blue – but a tidier CD version is also available. From around the same era, the “super deluxe” boxed set of The Beatles’ Let it Be has just been set free. As well as various versions of the original LP, Beatles nuts will enjoy 27 previously unreleased session recordings and a nicely presented 100-page book. The music fan you really, really (really) love deserves all eight LPs of American Dreamer, a rigorous re-examination of Laura Nyro’s vivid career. From a little more recently, Radiohead Kid A Mnesia [sic] marks the 21st anniversary of that band’s Kid A and Amnesiac with a restoration accompanied by hitherto unheard tracks from the sessions.

All these collections will look lust lovely under the tree. You can’t say that of a subscription to Spotify (though that’s not a bad idea either).

And another thing

John Boyne, author of such bestsellers as A Ladder to the Sky and The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, suggests Elton John’s recently released The Lockdown Sessions as a Christmas gift.

“It features duets with people like Charlie Puth, Eddie Vedder, Stevie Wonder and Nicki Minaj,” he says. “People always talk about Elton’s ’70s output but, for me, there’s been no more consistent artist. Each album from since 2001’s Songs from the West Coast has been masterful – examining the history of his and Bernie Taupin’s career.”

John also suggests catching up with this year’s “underrated” TV series Nine Perfect Strangers, now available as a reasonably priced DVD set, and, from older material, he recommends gifting the boxed set comprising all series of Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister. “They are my favourite comedy shows ever,” he says of the parliamentary satires. “I can return to them time and again and they still make me laugh. Great writing, three brilliant central performances and a realistic and eviscerating look at government.”