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Science and nature booksIn an extract from her new book about how the female body drove human evolution, the writer ponders ovaries, pregnancy and why sperm and eggs behave so differently How women drove evolution: Cat Bohannon on her radical new history of humanity Here’s a modern love story for you: a friend of mine recently asked if I would be willing to donate my eggs. He and his wife, both professors at Harvard, wanted to have a child. [Read More]

All clothes: Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello. Photograph: Chris Colls/The GuardianAll clothes: Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello. Photograph: Chris Colls/The GuardianCharlotte GainsbourgInterviewCharlotte Gainsbourg: ‘Everything now is so politically correct. So boring’Arwa MahdawiThe actor and singer grew up in her parents’ shadow, and starred in Lars Von Trier’s most extreme films. She talks about why she’s finally comfortable in her own skin When Charlotte Gainsbourg was 16, she came home from school to find her mother distraught and the police waiting for her. [Read More]

Soap operaObituaryGavin Blyth obituaryProducer who led a revamp of EmmerdaleGavin Blyth, who has died of cancer aged 41, rose through the television soap ranks to become producer of Emmerdale, the serial set in rural Yorkshire that long ago dropped the "farm" from its title, and lit up the eponymous village with illicit affairs, explosions and back-stabbing. After taking the reins in January 2009, Blyth introduced new characters, including Lizzie Lakely – the first regular role in a British soap to be taken by a blind actor (Kitty McGeever) – and the Barton family, who took over the Sugdens' farm. [Read More]

Television industryObituaryHugh LloydA much-loved comedy actor, he went on to more serious rolesPerky and cheeky, or lugubrious and sad, Hugh Lloyd, who has died aged 85, was for more than 50 years one of Britain's best-loved comedy actors, working as a partner with some of the funniest television comedians of the age and ruling the roost as chief comic in numerous seaside shows and pantomimes. Two years after his first radio programme, the Stay at Home Show, Lloyd made his television debut in 1950 in the Centre Show, broadcast for troops. [Read More]

Observer European filmFilmThe must-see movies that have defined a century of European cinema, as chosen by the Observer’s film writers Back in 2017, I was asked to contribute a short piece about British cinema to a book entitled Goodbye Europe. The book was a collection of essays, inspired by the recent referendum, offering a series of different perspectives on the thorny subject of the UK’s relationship to Europe, and “what the idea of Europe means to Britons and others living here”. [Read More]

CanadaRed River porridge, first concocted in Winnipeg in 1924, left a huge hole when it was discontinued It’s been more than a year since Juanita Metzger cooked the perfect bowl of Red River hot cereal, a blend of cracked wheat, rye and flax that commands a cult-like following across Canada. “It’s got to be thick enough but not gluey. It’s got to be crunchy enough but not undercooked,” she said of the porridge. [Read More]

TheatreReviewWyndham’s theatre, London At two hours with no interval, the actor-director’s production hurtles past at such speed that the depths of the play are too rarely realised Kenneth Branagh has confirmed his mercurial ability to inhabit Shakespeare’s flawed heroes over decades on stage and film. We have come to expect great things: energy, polish and accomplished verse diction. That is what we get here, in his production of what some believe to be the most tragic of Shakespearean downfalls. [Read More]

Spaghettini col piselli – fine spaghetti with peas Photograph: Romas Foord for Observer Food MontlyView image in fullscreenSpaghettini col piselli – fine spaghetti with peas Photograph: Romas Foord for Observer Food MontlyClassic cookbookFoodIn the second of our series celebrating vintage books from our kitchen shelves, Jeremy Lee shares his love for Honey From a Weed It was 1986. I had not long arrived in London but regularly visited the fine emporium Books For Cooks in Notting Hill. [Read More]

SculptureIt is one of the poorest parts of the planet, a place where workers earn $1 a day – which is why, according to one artist, the plantations of eastern Congo really need an art galleryNext month, Renzo Martens, along with his wife, son and baby daughter, are going to live in eastern Congo so he can continue his five-year plan to gentrify the jungle. The 41-year-old Dutch artist is trying to create an arts scene in one of the most impoverished parts of the world. [Read More]

National TheatreObituaryTony Haygarth obituaryDistinctive supporting actor on television, stage and filmTony Haygarth, who has died aged 72, was a salt-of-the-earth Liverpudlian actor who became a familiar face on television in series such as Emmerdale (in which he played Mick Naylor), The Bill and New Tricks, while sustaining a reputation as one of Britain’s most distinctive, and reliable, supporting actors on the main national stages. In the mid-1990s this reputation became a little more serious when he won Equity’s Clarence Derwent award for his performance as a compromised racetrack commissioner in Sam Shepard’s Simpatico, a wonderful series of duologues in junk towns on the freeway running from Los Angeles to the desert, at the Royal Court; and secured an Olivier award nomination for his magnificent performance as the blustery redneck Juror No 3 in Harold Pinter’s West End revival of Twelve Angry Men. [Read More]