Adelaide festival
This won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but Huppert delivers an exacting performance in Robert Wilson’s hypnotic, incantatory play

• Get our weekend culture and lifestyle email

Mary, Queen of Scots is one of those perennial figures trotted out as a universal signifier, often for femininity itself, an image of rectitude and self-sacrifice in the face of unimaginable deprivation. The problem is that the historical record doesn’t quite support this narrative: Mary possibly conspired to murder her second husband in order to marry her third, and despite protestations to the contrary, remained a serious threat to the reign of Elizabeth I until the moment she was executed. She was a political player who lost, not an ingenue caught in the crossfire of history.

Famed French stage and screen actor Isabelle Huppert has worked with equally famed (and now sadly late) American theatre maker Robert Wilson twice before this collaboration, and it’s easy to see why she would come back a third time, like Mary to the matrimonial bed. Wilson’s artistic rigour was legendary, and his uncompromising aesthetic – so absolute it seems almost brutalist – frames Huppert’s singular talent superbly. She shimmers on stage, a regal pride emanating from her body and the precision of her movements. This is undeniably Huppert’s show.

Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning

How a boardroom flare-up sparked an international boycott – and a looming defamation battle

It began as a quiet programming dispute in the genteel city of churches.

But by Wednesday morning, a frantic, six-day war of words had culminated in the end of the 2026 Adelaide writers’ week and total institutional collapse.

The band pulled out over treatment of Randa Abdel-Fattah but delayed revealing their decision before confirming 27 February gig

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The British indie band Pulp will play at the Adelaide festival in February after initially pulling out of the event in protest at the cancellation of Palestinian writer Randa Abdel-Fattah.

The band issued a statement on social media on Thursday night announcing that they would “honour our invitation to perform in Adelaide on 27 February” after the festival organisers performed a U-turn, apologised to Abdel-Fattah for her treatment and invited her to speak at next year’s event.

Apology comes as former Adelaide festival board member accuses Louise Adler of hypocrisy after she resigned citing free speech concerns

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The new Adelaide festival board has issued a public apology to Palestinian Australian academic Randa Abdel-Fattah, and has promised she will be invited to Adelaide writers’ week in 2027.

Abdel-Fattah immediately accepted the apology, posting on Instagram that it was a vindication “of our collective solidarity and mobilisation against anti-Palestinian racism, bullying and censorship”.

Randa Abdel-Fattah, who is Palestinian Australian, has faced criticism for controversial comments on Israel, including alleging Zionists had ‘no claim or right to cultural safety’

When the board of a South Australian festival cut a prominent Palestinian Australian author from its lineup, citing her “past statements” in the context of the deadly Bondi terror attack, it no doubt braced itself for controversy.

What it may not have foreseen, however, is an implosion.

Almost all remaining festival board members have resigned after backlash to decision to disinvite the Palestinian Australian author

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Adelaide writers’ week 2026 has been cancelled after days of turmoil as more than 180 authors and speakers dropped out in protest of the decision to disinvite the Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah.

In a statement on Tuesday afternoon, the Adelaide festival board announced the event, which was scheduled to begin on 28 February, would no longer go ahead. The three remaining members of the festival board have resigned immediately, after the resignations of four others – with the exception of the Adelaide city council representative, whose term expires in February.

Resignations follow withdrawal of more than 70 participants in writers’ week after Palestinian Australian author disinvited

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The Adelaide festival is facing an unprecedented leadership crisis after three board members resigned this weekend.

The journalist Daniela Ritorto, the Adelaide businesswoman Donny Walford and the lawyer Nick Linke stepped down at an extraordinary board meeting on Saturday following the board’s controversial decision to dump the Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah from the 2026 writers’ week program.

Helen Garner and Miles Franklin winner Michelle de Kretser among 47 people who have pulled out of annual writers’ festival to protest Abdel-Fattah’s axing

• Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The Adelaide festival has pulled down part of its website as dozens of speakers said they were boycotting writers’ week, after Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah was dumped from the lineup with the board citing “cultural sensitivity” concerns in the wake of the Bondi terror attack.

The page promoting the schedule of authors, journalists, academics and commentators was “unpublished” on Friday following widespread condemnation of the board’s decision to remove Abdel-Fattah.