Almost a decade after becoming the Turner’s second youngest winner, the artist talks about her dazzling new opera sets, her paper bag collection – and the sadness she felt when her work was wildly misinterpreted

‘I don’t think I’ve ever worked so hard,” says Helen Marten. “I’ve literally not taken a day off for four months.” The artist is talking about 30 Blizzards, a two-hour opera for which she was commissioned, by Art Basel Paris and the fashion brand Miu Miu, to write the libretto and design the staging. Featuring 30 main characters – named things like The Mother, The Baker, The Asphalt, The Forest – and a chorus collectively called Dust, the whole piece moves from “deepest night through all of these iterations of the day – dawn, afternoon, then back to deepest night”. It will take place in a space 200 metres long, with the audience able to mingle with the performers throughout.

It sounds exhausting, but Marten, by her own admission, is “a total workaholic”. During our lengthy chat, she repeatedly darts off to leaf through a file, pull up a video, glance through a book, or play a voice memo – talking all the while.

The Hollywood star narrates kooky comedy Leonard and Hungry Paul. Plus: how the letters of Mary, Queen of Scots were decoded. Here’s what to watch this evening

10pm, BBC Two
Julia Roberts narrates an endearing comedy drama based on Rónán Hession’s novel. Leonard (Alex Lawther) is a thirtysomething oddball who lives with his doting mother. But when she suddenly dies, Leonard finds himself looking for more from his quiet life. Joining him is his best friend, Hungry Paul (Laurie Kynaston). Might a new extrovert colleague, played by Jamie-Lee O’Donnell, be the key to opening up Leonard’s world? Hollie Richardson

From shadowing a cocaine-addled David Bowie to winning over Joni Mitchell, deliciously readable tales from the director of Almost Famous

Cameron Crowe spent his youth being in the right place at the right time. In 1964, aged seven, he was taken by his mother to see “a kid named Bob Dylan” play a local college gym. By the age of 14, living in San Diego, he was writing record reviews for a local underground magazine whose main aim was to bring down Richard Nixon. Shortly after that, he started interviewing the bands of the day as they came through California – first Humble Pie for Creem , and then the Eagles, the Allman Brothers Band and Led Zeppelin for Rolling Stone.

Crowe previously fictionalised his story in the 2000 film Almost Famous , which he wrote and directed. His lyrical and compulsively readable memoir The Uncool is bookended by the opening of a musical version, which coincides with the death of Crowe’s mother Alice whose aphorisms, including “Put some goodness in the world before it blows up”, are scattered throughout the book. Alice insisted that Crowe skip two school grades, driving his precocity; she was also dead against rock’n’roll on account of its unbridled hedonism. When Crowe asks her what Elvis did on The Ed Sullivan Show that was so subversive he had to be filmed from the waist up, she “clinically” replies: “He had an erection”.

The actor is a laconic delight as he dispenses surprising levels of wisdom in response to reader questions, while Obama, Paul McCartney and Ayo Edebiri pay homage to an African musical great

Bill Nighy is the agony uncle you never knew you needed as he answers readers’ questions in his new show. It’s a laconic delight, listening to his louche suggestions on topics from lipstick application to decluttering a record collection. Wisdom is being dispensed – despite his self-deprecating protestations. A lexi Duggins
Widely available, episodes weekly

This hybrid documentary about the Cree astronomer offers evocative, poetic insight into a formidable community leader

For Cree astronomer Wilfred Buck, the stars hold an immense power that extends beyond the realm of science. Coming from an Indigenous group whose stories have been systematically effaced by official narratives, he looks to these clustered dots of light as both historical document and spiritual manifestation. Echoing Buck’s holistic approach to astronomy, Lisa Jackson’s hybrid documentary draws from a wealth of eclectic visual styles, all woven into a stunning portrait of a formidable community elder.

Someone always on the go, Buck is often seen behind the wheel, heading from one job to another. Speaking at academic conferences and workshops, and leading lectures and presentations for young students, he not only makes astronomy accessible but also builds lasting connections between different generations. This sense of togetherness is especially touching considering Buck’s own tragic family history. He was separated from his siblings growing up, after they were forcibly removed from their parents by the state. His home life was gripped by a cycle of addiction, poverty and depression.

Riba and Fawcett Society survey finds many are afraid to report bullying, sexual harassment and unequal pay

Two decades after a seminal report on sexism in architecture, women are still abandoning the profession because of “toxic workplace cultures”, sexual harassment, long hours and unequal pay, according to a report from the Royal Institute of British Architects (Riba).

Female architects still faced intractable barriers, including “long hours being glorified, an imbalance of power between employers and employees, lack of clear policies and proactive action, and stark displays of sexism within practices”, according to the Riba Build It Together report, produced with the equality charity the Fawcett Society.

Half of all female respondents had experienced bullying at work

A third had been sexually harassed

A majority felt their architecture career progression had been stymied by having children

It is now seven decades since Little Richard sang Tutti Frutti – and a rip-roaring new type of music burst out into the world. But is rock’n’roll about to die out? Our writer goes searching for signs of life

No one can really say when rock’n’roll was invented. You could say March 1951, with the release of Rocket 88 by Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats. Or maybe July 1954, when Elvis Presley, Scotty Moore and Bill Black stopped messing around between takes at Sun Studios and started hammering through That’s All Right, which became the future King’s first single.

But the year rock’n’roll really became rock’n’roll was 70 years ago, in 1955: the year Little Richard burst on to the world with Tutti Frutti; the year of the first riot at an Elvis show; the year of Blue Suede Shoes and Maybellene; the year of Bo Diddley singing his own praises. In the US, Rock Around the Clock by Bill Haley & His Comets was the biggest record that year. In the UK, its presence on the soundtrack of the teensploitation movie The Blackboard Jungle reportedly sent teddy boys into rampages of cinema-smashing.

Like so many others, his days have been spent in the gig economy, moving from one precarious job to another, often tied to a gruelling 996 shift pattern. He discusses the harsh realities of modern working life in China, and far beyond

Hu Anyan is not a fan of online shopping, but, as he discovered during the months he spent as a courier in Beijing, plenty of people are. Not long into the job, he was assigned to delivering parcels to a large construction site. He didn’t have to deliver that many – 10 to 20, most days – but getting them to their rightful owners wasn’t always easy. There was a crane driver who was often in the air when Hu arrived. He would ask him to come again the next day, only to be found in the sky again.

“In the end,” Hu writes in his memoir, I Deliver Parcels in Beijing – which is being published in English for the first time this month – “it would take several trips” to deliver this man his parcel. “But this didn’t dampen his passion for online shopping.” As a courier, Hu had to work to an exacting schedule, making a delivery every four minutes so as not to run at a loss. Couriers were paid 1.6 yuan, the equivalent of 17p, for every parcel they delivered, but the task was much more involved than that of couriers in the UK. He sometimes had to wait while people tried things on and then repackaged rejected items on the spot. Plus, he had to pay compensation for every parcel that went missing.

Australian band’s decision to remove catalogue in protest of CEO’s military investments an easy one, frontman says, and making music with friends remains ‘top of the triangle’

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Over their mind-boggling 15-year, 27-album career, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard have switched gears with the speed and abandon of a stunt driver in a Fast and Furious film. Can you even describe the six-piece as a psychedelic rock band any more?

Their music to date has encompassed metal, folk, jazz and dance music; they have experimented with dense concept records and microtonal tunings, and this year they’ve been touring both an orchestral show and a rave show, alongside residencies in European prisons and amphitheatres.

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