

Front Row
BBC Radio 4
Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music
Episodes
Mentioned books

Mar 16, 2023 • 42min
Richard Eyre on his film Allelujah, and climate change TV drama Extrapolations reviewed
Richard Eyre on directing the screen version of Alan Bennett’s play Allelujah, starring Jennifer Saunders, set on the geriatric ward of a fictional Yorkshire hospital, the Bethlehem, and on raising questions about how society cares for its older population.We review the star-studded Apple TV+ climate change series Extrapolations, and a new exhibition at the Royal Academy in London, Souls Grown Deep like the Rivers - Black Artists from the American South. Our reviewers are writer and comic artist Woodrow Phoenix - and YA author, script editor and founder of the international Climate Fiction Writers League, Lauren James.Presenter: Samira Ahmed
Producer: Sarah Johnson

Mar 15, 2023 • 42min
Scottish-Iranian film Winners, playwright Calum L MacLeòid, neurodiversity and creativity
Filmmaker Hassan Nazar talks to Kate Molleson about his new film Winners, a love letter to the art of cinema. Set in Iran, it follows two children who find an Oscars statuette. Playwright Calum L MacLeòid on his new Western, Stornaway, Quebec, which is set in 1880s Canada and performed in Gaelic, Québécois, and English.And to mark Neurodiversity Celebration Week, Front Row discusses neurodiversity and creativity with impressionist Rory Bremner, stand-up comedian Ria Lina, and psychologist Professor Nancy Doyle. Presenter: Kate Molleson
Producer: Paul Waters

Mar 14, 2023 • 42min
Diversity at the Oscars and Baftas; plays and the cost of living; children's books; Phyllida Barlow
The conclusion of the Oscars marks the end of the film awards season, so Front Row took the opportunity to look at the progress made on representation in film and at awards. Tom is joined by the film critic Amon Warmann, Katherine Pieper of LA's Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, which looks at equalities at the Oscars, and Marcus Ryder of the Lenny Henry Centre For Media Diversity.Plus, with a host of new productions exploring the cost of living crisis, we look at how playwrights are tackling this. Writer Emily White talks about her new play, Joseph K and the Cost of Living, being staged as part of a three-part project at the Swansea Grand Theatre, and the writer and critic Sarah Crompton discusses theatre's response to social and political issues on stage. Bex Lindsay, presenter on Fun Kids Radio and children’s books expert, joins us for a round-up of some of the most interesting and engaging new releases for young independent readers. Books discussed:
Like A Curse by Elle McNicoll
Montgomery Bonbon: Murder at the Museum by Alasdair Beckett-King
Skandar and the Unicorn Thief/The Phantom Rider by AF Steadman
Jamie by L D Lapinski
Onyeka and the Rise of the Rebels by Tola Okogwu
I Spy, A Bletchley Park Mystery by Rhian Tracey
Saving Neverland, by Abi ElphinstonePresenter: Tom Sutcliffe
Producer: Emma WallaceMain Image: Michelle Yeoh

Mar 13, 2023 • 42min
Author Percival Everett, director Pravesh Kumar on Little English
Author Percival Everett on his novel Dr No; Director Pravesh Kumar on his film Little English; the new Yeats Smartphones poetry trail in BedfordAward-winning US novelist Percival Everett on his surreal new book, Dr No – in which unlikely heroes and uber-wealthy super villains chase after a box containing absolutely nothing.Pravesh Kumar has been running a theatre company for over two decades and last year received an MBE in the New Year Honours List for services to theatre. As he makes his debut as a filmmaker with romantic comedy Little English - centred on a British South Asian family living in Slough - he discusses the importance of nuanced portrayals and overturning stereotypes.It’s a century this year since W. B. Yeats won the Nobel Prize in literature for his poetry, ‘which…gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation.’ This is marked by a new guided, smartphone app trail around places where he lived and that influenced him early in life. It is narrated and with poems read by Oscar nominated actor Ciarán Hinds. But it is not, as you might assume, in Ireland. Front Row reports from the launch. Presenter: Samira Ahmed
Producer: Julian May(Picture of Percival Everett. Photographer credit: Nacho Goberna)

Mar 9, 2023 • 42min
Film My Sailor, My Love; Atwood’s Old Babes In The Wood; Baillie Gifford prize; Nicole Flattery
New Irish film, My Sailor, My Love, by Finnish director, Klaus Härö, and a new collection of short stories, Old Babes in the Wood, by Margaret Atwood. To review, Tom is joined by author Ashley Hickson-Lovence and academic Sarah Churchwell. Plus the Baillie Gifford prize – the six books shortlisted for the ‘winner of winners’ award. And Irish author Nicole Flattery on her debut novel Nothing Special.Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe
Producer: Paul Waters

Mar 8, 2023 • 37min
Pioneering play Top Girls turns 40, do publishers owe a duty of care to memoirists? and the benefits of stopping the show
A reimagining of Caryl Churchill’s ground-breaking and celebrated play, Top Girls, opens this week at the Liverpool Everyman which sets the play – about female ambition and success across centuries and cultures - in Merseyside. Playwright Charlotte Keatley and theatre critic Susannah Clapp discuss the play’s themes and its continuing impact forty years after its premiere.Prince Harry’s book Spare and the ripples it’s created have led to questions about the writing and publication of memoirs. In recent years, there has been a widening of the voices encouraged to write and getting published, but what is the impact on the authors, and should there be a greater duty of care? Agent Rachel Mills and Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of The Last Act of Love, a memoir about losing her brother, join Front Row to discuss.The show must go on has long been the mantra of those working in theatre but last August, David Byrne, Artistic Director of New Diorama Theatre, made an astonishing announcement which began with the words, “The end of the show must go on” and went on to state that the theatre would be closing its doors for at least six months to allow time for an artistic reset. As New Diorama Theatre reopens, David joins Front Row to discuss what the resetting has revealed.Presenter: Nick Ahad
Producer: Ekene AkalawuPicture: Top Girls – Lauren Lane as Pope Joan – Photographer’s Credit Marc Brenner

Mar 7, 2023 • 42min
Daniel Mays on a new production of Guys and Dolls, and how accessible are venues and film sets for performers?
Daniel Mays talks to Samira Ahmed about starring as Nathan Detroit in a new immersive production of the musical Guys and Dolls at the Bridge Theatre in south London.Front Row investigates how accessible theatres and gig venues are, not just for audiences but for performers. Reporter Carolyn Atkinson talks to a comedian and a DJ who have struggled with access and asks how venues should be addressing the problem. And actor Julie Fernandez and producer Sara Johnson discuss a new scheme to train access co-ordinators in film and television. The scheme aims to make the industry more accessible for deaf, disabled and neurodivergent cast and crew. Presenter: Samira Ahmed
Producer: Julian May

Mar 6, 2023 • 42min
Steven Moffat and Lucy Caldwell on writing about the Hadron Collider
Sherlock and Dr Who writer Steven Moffat, and Lucy Caldwell, winner of the BBC National Short Story Award, discuss writing short stories inspired by the science of the Large Hadron Collider for a new collection called Collision. The project pairs a team of award-winning authors with Cern physicists to explore some of the discoveries being made, through fiction. From interstellar travel using quantum tunnelling, to first contact with antimatter aliens, to a team of scientists finding themselves being systematically erased from history, these stories explore the dark matters that only physics can offer answers to. A new documentary called Subject explores the life-altering experience of sharing one’s life on screen, through the participants of five acclaimed documentaries. Samira Ahmed talks to Camilla Hall, one of the film’s directors, about the ethics of documentary making. Writer Mojisola Adebayo and director Matthew Xia talk about their new play Family Tree, which won the Alfred Fagon Best New Play Award. The play, which opens at the Belgrade Theatre Coventry, explores the extraordinary story of Henrietta Lacks, the African American woman whose cancer cells were taken without her permission or knowledge in 1951 and which are still informing medical science today.Presenter: Samira Ahmed
Producer: Eliane Glaser

Mar 2, 2023 • 42min
Daisy Jones & The Six on TV. Lukas Dhont’s film Close. Edmund De Waal on potter Lucie Rie
Riley Keough and Sam Claflin star in the 10-part adaptation of Taylor Jenkins Reid’s novel Daisy Jones And The Six, the story of a fictional 70s band loosely inspired by Fleetwood Mac. Belgian director Lukas Dhont’s film Close, about two teenage boys whose close friendship is challenged by their schoolmates, won the Grand Prix at Cannes. Critics Tim Robey and Kate Mossman join Front Row to review both.Plus Edmund de Waal on late fellow potter Lucie Rie's life and work as a new retrospective opens at Kettle's Yard in Cambridge.Presenter: Shahidha Bari
Producer: Sarah Johnson

Mar 1, 2023 • 42min
Barry Male Voice Choir, new play Romeo and Julie, WNO’s Blaze of Glory and Welsh culture minister Dawn Boden
On St David's Day Front Row is coming from Cardiff with Huw Stephens bringing the latest arts and culture stories of Wales. Welsh National Opera’s latest production is Blaze of Glory. The librettist Emma Jenkins and composer David Hackbridge Johnson talk to Huw Stephens about their new opera. Set in a Welsh Valleys’ village in the 1950s, it follows the a group of miners who raise spirits following a pit disaster by reforming their male voice choir. Dawn Bowden, Deputy Minister for Arts and Sports, and Chief Whip in the Welsh Government, discusses cultural policy in Wales.Gary Owen talks about his new play Romeo and Julie, the story of young lovers in the Cardiff district of Splott. They’re faced with circumstances that threaten to separate them but there the similarity to Shakespeare ends.And the Barry Male Voice choir, who are involved in the production of Blaze of Glory, perform live in the Front Row studio.Presenter: Huw Stephens
Producer: Julian May and Rebecca Stratford