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Jodie Comer in Her Big Chance from Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads.
Jodie Comer in Her Big Chance from Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads. Photograph: Zac Nicholson/BBC/PA
Jodie Comer in Her Big Chance from Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads. Photograph: Zac Nicholson/BBC/PA

From Talking Heads to a painter with seven fingers: the Observer culture quiz

This article is more than 3 years old

Test your arts knowledge with these questions from our critics

  1. 1.The recent TV version of Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads featured a slew of 2020 actors reprising roles first taken in 1988 and 1998. Two monologues were newly written, and two, A Cream Cracker Under the Settee and Waiting for the Telegram, were not refilmed, being deemed unbetterable. Who was the original talking head in both cases?
  2. 2.The daughter of an Irish musician is currently enthralling some of our Sunday evenings with lashings of laudanum and Maori magic. With which of these songs did her father once top the US Billboard chart?
  3. 3.Which London location inspired Mendelssohn’s popular Spring Song?
  4. 4.What do Charlize Theron, Zoe Saldana and Christian Bale have in common?
  5. 5.Which artist painted himself with seven fingers?
  6. 6.Before he moved into the world of film, the late director Joel Schumacher worked as what?
  7. 7.Which of the following is NOT true of Russell Crowe?
  8. 8.Which Victorian novelist was also a theatrical business manager?
  9. 9.Which artist painted herself playing a lute?
  10. 10.Which of these TV titles, as printed here, has a grammatical, syntactical or spelling error?
  11. 11.Peter Dalton, Wayne Furniss and Jamie Pinchbeck were early, pre‑fame members of which Sheffield band?
  12. 12.Who said “in this house with its four walls of glass I feel like a prowling animal, always on the alert”?
  13. 13.Many Haydn symphonies have nicknames, including one of the following. Which?
  14. 14.In which play is the word “critic” used as an expletive?
  15. 15.Who called what “that great heap of stones”?
  16. 16.Who urged us to Give Ireland Back to the Irish and was banned for their trouble?
  17. 17.Neil Jordan’s 1992 thriller The Crying Game borrowed its title from a song released by whom?
  18. 18.Who is Sasha Fierce?
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