Front Row

37 years after its landmark first production starring Paul Scofield as Salieri and Simon Callow as Mozart, Peter Schaffer's play Amadeus returns to the National Theatre in London. Director Michael Longhurst and Lucian Msamati - who plays Salieri - discuss their new production which features a 30-piece orchestra live on stage.Before she became famous for creating the freckle-faced optimist Pippi Longstocking, Astrid Lindgren was an aspiring author living in Stockholm at the outbreak of World War II. Astrid's daughter Karin Nyman and author Meg Rosoff discuss A World Gone Mad - Astrid Lindgren's War Diaries, now available for the first time in English, which paint a picture of life in a neutral country during the conflict, and her emergence as a writer. As the Creative Industries Federation publishes its report on the possible impact of Brexit on the Arts, we speak to its Chief Executive John Kampfner about the key findings. Turner Prize-winning artist Richard Wright discusses his gold-leaf, ornamental design f

Bryan Cranston played a hapless dad in Malcom in the Middle, a dentist to the stars in Seinfeld, and most famously a teacher-turned-drugs-lord in Breaking Bad. Now he has written an autobiography. Cranston discusses A Life in Parts which recalls the many odd parts he's played in real life - paperboy, security guard, dating consultant, murder suspect, husband, father and, of course, actor.One of the last projects David Bowie worked on was his musical Lazarus which includes new music and some of his best-known hits. The production which broke box office records when it played in New York has now transferred to a specially-built venue in London. We speak to Enda Walsh, Bowie's co-writer on the project, and the show's director Ivo van Hove about bringing Bowie's vision to life. Paul Beatty has become the first US author to win the Man Booker Prize, with his racial satire The Sellout. It marks the second win in a row for independent publisher Oneworld who also published last year's winner, A Brief History of Seven

Shakespeare's Globe artistic director Emma Rice is to leave the theatre in 2018 after its board decided her methods are not authentic enough. Rice took charge of the London theatre in January but has come in for fierce criticism, including for her use of sound and lighting technology. Theatre critics Sarah Hemming, of the Financial Times, and Ann Treneman of the Times, discuss the reasons for Rice's departure and The Globe's future.In a month's time the new Design Museum in London will be unveiled, having moved from its Thames-side home to its new, larger location, the building that was the Grade II* listed Commonwealth Institute in Kensington High St. John Pawson, the architect who has designed the interiors, and Dejan Sudjic, director of the Design Museum, give John Wilson the first access to the £83m project.As Boyz N The Hood goes back into cinemas to mark its 25th Anniversary - and as a centrepiece of the British Film Institute's Black Star season - John Singleton talks to John Wilson about writing and d

Jude Law stars as a young dogmatic pontiff in Oscar winning director Paolo Sorrentino's new television drama The Young Pope. John Wilson speaks to actor and director about papal politics, football playing nuns and working on the small screen.As Tate Britain opens their retrospective of Paul Nash we speak to curator Emma Chambers and comic artist Dave McKean, who has created a graphic novel inspired by Paul Nash's dreams, about why Nash was such an important artist both on and beyond the battlefield.As libraries are closing around the country South Shields opens a new one which goes way beyond books and shelves. The Word is a state of the art cultural venue and the National Centre for the Written Word. John hears from Tanya Robinson, who has steered the project, and writer Tom Kelly about his ongoing interactive exhibition Lost Dialects, seeking to bring local words back to life, and find new ones.The ballet critic Luke Jennings thinks the art is in crisis because even when the dance is new, the stories are al

Chrissie Hynde, singer and founding member of the Pretenders, discusses Alone, the band's first album in eight years.A new £30,000 arts award, The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture, aims to recognise an artist who has made a significant contribution to the development of contemporary sculpture in Britain. The shortlisted artists Phyllida Barlow, Steven Claydon, Helen Marten and David Medalla share their thoughts on the practice of sculpture today.Today Historic England published its annual Heritage At Risk register featuring buildings identified as in danger of being lost due to neglect or decay. The Grade I listed medieval house, West Horsley Place, inherited by the historian and broadcaster Bamber Gascoigne, has been added to the register. He discusses what this means for his plans to create an opera house on the site.Joe Queenan reports from New York on the cultural hinterland of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.Presenter John Wilson Producer Jerome Weatherald.

In 1912, 24 scouts from the slums of South East London set sail from Waterloo Bridge, but in a tragic accident eight drowned. Stella Duffy discusses her new novel, London Lies Beneath, in which she recreates that area of London and imagines the lives of the families involved in the months leading up to the tragedy and beyond.With news that the £21m New Art Gallery Walsall is being threatened with closure just 16 years after it opened, Bob and Roberta Smith, former artist-in-residence, gives his response.At the age of 19, Yves Klein identified the blue sky in Nice as his first artwork. It marked the beginning of an artistic career which ended with his heart attack at the age of 34. Art critic Richard Cork reviews a new exhibition of Klein's work at Tate Liverpool.Barrie Kosky's directorial debut at the Royal Opera House is Shostakovich's The Nose, based on a satirical story by Gogol, with a huge cast of singers and even more noses, all inspired, he says, by a very famous one - Barbara Streisand's.Presenter Sam

Ali Smith discusses her Brexit-era novel, Autumn, with Samira Ahmed. It's the first of a quartet which very much reflects the issues of today.Osmo Vänskä is about to conduct the London Philharmonic Orchestra playing all the symphonies of Sibelius. He speaks about the composer and Sibelius' place in Finnish national identity.In 1943 two African American brothers from Philadelphia performed a dance routine in the film Stormy Weather, which Fred Astaire would come to refer to as the greatest movie musical sequence he had ever seen. For Fayard and Harold Nicholas - otherwise known as The Nicholas Brothers - entering the Hollywood arena this was no small feat in the 1940's America, a time when racial prejudice was commonplace. Choreographer Stuart Thomas reflects on the achievement of the brothers who were regulars at Harlem's Cotton Club - working with the orchestras of Cab Calloway and Duke Ellington - and one of whom taught Michael Jackson to dance.There are old saws that depicting figures is prohibited in Isla

50 years since he made Cathy Come Home, Ken Loach discusses his latest film I, Daniel Blake, a characteristically angry indictment of Britain's welfare system. Following the announcement of the scrapping of A and AS levels in archaeology, Sir Tony Robinson reveals why he's backing the protest against this decision.Towards the end of his career the great French sculpture Auguste Rodin became fascinated with dance and bodies captured in extreme acrobatic poses. Now a new exhibition at the Courtauld Gallery - Rodin & Dance: The Essence of Movement - will display a series of experimental sculptures known as the Dance Movements made in 1911. John Wilson was joined there by the curator Dr Alexandra Gerstein and Royal Ballet Principal Dancer Sarah Lamb.Madness frontman Suggs discusses the band's new album Can't Touch Us Now, which as usual features colourful London characters, including Mr Apples, Amy Winehouse and Pam the Hawk.

As Phil Collins announces his return to the stage for his first live dates in 10 years, the former Genesis frontman discusses that and his new memoir Not Dead Yet.Two laureates, Gillian Clarke, who was the National Poet of Wales, and Carol Ann Duffy, talk about The Map and the Clock, their new anthology that moves through 14 centuries, several languages and all over these islands, to present their choice of the poetry of Britain and Ireland. Writer Patrick Ness is best known for his Carnegie-winning novels for young adults, including Monsters of Men and A Monster Calls. He discusses his first foray into television with Class, a new BBC spin-off of Doctor Who which sees a group of students try to save their school from attack. Presenter John Wilson Producer Jerome Weatherald.

Music legend Bob Dylan has won the Nobel Prize for Literature on the day the death of previous winner, playwright Dario Fo, was announced. We get reaction to both the singer-songwriter becoming a Nobel laureate and the legacy of the Italian who penned Accidental Death of an Anarchist.Tutankhamun is the new Sunday evening drama on ITV, focusing on Howard Carter's discovery in 1922 of the grave of the boy pharaoh buried in Egypt 3,300 years ago. The drama's writer Guy Burt discusses his approach to his telling of the story of 'King Tut'.Russian conductor Semyon Bychkov is embarking on a monumental Tchaikovsky project, with three concerts and the release of the 6th Symphony, the Pathétique, the first in a cycle of new recordings. He talks to Samira Ahmed about his lifelong relationship with the music of the composer he calls his 'beloved friend'.Presenter Samira Ahmed Producer Marilyn Rust.

Earl Cameron CBE was one of the first black stars of British cinema, making his big screen debut in 1950 with the crime drama, Pool of London. He's continued acting into his 90s, taking on roles in The Queen and Inception. Now 99, with a restored version of Pool of London about to released, and taking part in Black Star - the BFI's nationwide celebration of black screen stars - he talks to John Wilson about his long career.For his album, Release, music producer David Gledhill (aka SOULS) spent five years searching old field recordings of singers from the American south. He cleaned and edited each recording and built new songs around them. Gledhill discusses the making of the album with John Wilson, and explains how these songs were part of his grieving following the death of his wife.Alphonse Mucha is widely viewed as the Father of Art Nouveau. The Czech painter and illustrator first attracted attention when his beautifully detailed posters of actress superstar Sarah Bernhardt appeared around Paris in 1895. B

With her new film American Honey, British filmmaker Andrea Arnold has left behind the housing estates and tower blocks of her previous films Red Road and Fish Tank for a road movie set among the endless highways of America. Critic Briony Hanson reviews.American writer Bernice McFadden discusses her latest novel The Book of Harlan, which contrasts the music scene of the Harlem Renaissance and 1930s Paris with the story of the black victims of the Holocaust whose story is rarely heard, and in many cases wasn't believed when those who survived returned to the US. When the activist George Monbiot wrote an article about the scourge of loneliness, it had a huge impact, and publishers urged him to write a book. Instead, for the first time, he wrote some songs and got together with the musician Ewan McLennan. They talk about the resulting album, Breaking the Spell of Loneliness. Ella Hickson's new play Oil explores the history of the product, from its discovery to its role in the economy today, through the eyes of a

Director Mira Nair and Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong'o discuss their new film Queen of Katwe, which is based on the true story of Ugandan chess prodigy Phiona Mutesi.Newcastle Gateshead has beaten Sheffield, Blackpool and Bradford and been selected by the government to host a £5m Great Exhibition of the North in 2018. Carol Bell, Culture & Major Events Director, Newcastle Gateshead Initiative, talks about their plans for the major exhibition, which will showcase art, design and innovation from the north of England. 12 years after the last episode of Sex and the City, Sarah Jessica Parker is back on the small screen in Divorce, a comedy drama about the end of a marriage written by Catastrophe's Sharon Horgan. Stephen Armstrong reviews. In 1974 the Gaul trawler set off from Hull never to return, disappearing off the northern coast of Norway with all hands lost. Playwright Janet Plater talks about her new drama The Gaul at Hull Truck Theatre, which charts the experience of the wives and relatives left b

Director Kwame Kwei-Armah and writer Kemp Powers discuss their new production of One Night in Miami, a fictional account of the night in 1964 when boxer Cassius Clay chose to celebrate his world heavyweight victory in a hotel room with activist Malcolm X, singer Sam Cooke and football star Jim Brown. Poet, rapper and writer Kate Tempest describes her new album Let Them Eat Chaos, the follow-up to her Mercury-shortlisted album Everybody Down. It's a long poem, written for live performance, which centres on seven residents of a London street all awake at 4:48am. The Oscar-winning Polish film director Andrzej Wajda has died at the age of 90. During the war he joined the Polish resistance, and then studied to be a painter, before entering the Lodz Film School. Wajda's films chart the history of Poland through the wartime Warsaw Uprising, the suppression of the Solidarity movement, the fall of Communism and joining the EU. Ian Christie, professor of Film and Media History, looks back at the director's career.Shock

Supersonic is a new documentary charting the success of Oasis, the Manchester band with 8 number one albums and estimated sales of over 70 million. John talks to director Mat Whitecross - who also directed Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, the biopic of Ian Dury - about charting brothers Liam and Noel Gallagher's rapid rise to stardom.In Mel Gibson's new film Blood Father, the actor is cast as a recovering alcoholic with anger issues, capitalising on the actor's off-screen controversies over the past decade. Antonia Quirke reviews.Beyond Caravaggio at the National Gallery, which focuses on the work of the Italian painter and his influence on the art of his contemporaries and followers, is reviewed by Waldemar Januszczak.Sir Karl Jenkins discusses his new choral work Cantata Memoria - For the Children, in commemoration of those killed in the Aberfan disaster 50 years ago, which has its world premiere in Cardiff tomorrow.Presenter John Wilson Producer Jerome Weatherald.

Documentary filmmaker Louis Theroux discusses his new film My Scientology Movie, Jimmy Savile, and his particular documentary-making style.To celebrate National Poetry Day, PJ Harvey, Daljit Nagra and Holly McNish will each be introducing and reading a new poem each for Front Row.Sara Lloyd from the Welsh-language National Theatre Wales, Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru, and Thomas Cloarec from Breton company Teatr Piba discuss their collaboration on a new play. Merch yr Eog (The Salmon's Daughter) is performed in Welsh, Breton, French and Creole and translated for the audience through a smartphone app. Presenter Samira Ahmed Producer Marilyn Rust.

Christopher Frayling, Guest Curator of this year's Widescreen Weekend festival at the National Media Museum, and the filmmaker Mike Figgis, famed for his technologically ground-breaking films such as Timecode, discuss the possibilities of the latest cinematic evolution - Virtual Reality. Samira hears from director Phyllida Lloyd about the final production in her trilogy of Shakespeare plays with all-female casts and set in a prison - The Tempest - with Harriet Walter playing Prospero and with Shakespeare's songs newly set by Joan Armatrading.A new exhibition of Pablo Picasso's portraits at the National Portrait Gallery in London is the first time in 20 years that so many of his representations of his family and friends have been brought together and, as the curator Prof Elizabeth Cowling explains, it reveals his wit, humour and passion as well as the extraordinary range of styles and media he employed during his life.As a child Simon Gronowski was pushed from a moving train by his mother. Her actions saved hi

John Wilson hosts the BBC National Short Story Award live from the BBC Radio Theatre. This year's shortlisted authors are Hilary Mantel, K J Orr, Tahmima Anam, Claire-Louise Bennett and Lavinia Greenlaw. Four of the five join John on stage to discuss their stories and explore the art of writing a short story. The winner of the £15000 prize will be announced by Chair of Judges, Jenni Murray.In addition, Radio 1 DJ Alice Levine will announce the winner of the BBC Young Writer's Award.The BBC National Short Story Award is presented in conjunction with BookTrust.Presenter John Wilson Producer Rebecca Armstrong.

Tom Stoppard discusses the new production of his "dishevelled comedy" Travesties, Brexit and his desire to write a new play about the migrant crisis.The Girl on The Train, Paula Hawkins' thriller about a divorced alcoholic who becomes caught up in a missing person investigation, has sold 11 million copies worldwide and been turned into a film starring Emily Blunt. But has the transition onto the silver screen and the move from London to New York worked? Mark Eccleston reviews.We report from Shapes of Water, Sounds of Hope, a mass participatory performance artwork, led by the distinguished American artist Suzanne Lacy which took place in Pendle, Lancashire this weekend.As a new exhibition opens exploring the Feminist Avant-Garde of the 1970s, artist Lynn Hershman Leeson and historian Professor Hilary Robinson look back at those years and ask if there's still a need for feminist art today?And we remember the conductor and violinist Sir Neville Marriner, who has died aged 92. Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: R

The Deepwater Horizon oil spill was the worst environmental disaster in US history. Now a new film starring Mark Wahlberg tells the story of the explosion which destroyed the offshore drilling rig. He joins director Peter Berg to discuss the making of this biographical disaster movie.It's Woody Allen's first television series, and stars Miley Cyrus and Allen himself. Rachel Cooke reviews Crisis in Six Scenes, the story of a young 1960s radical and the elderly couple she moves in with.As he turns 60, the pianist Melvyn Tan talks about popularising the fortepiano, the predecessor to the modern piano, and what it's like to perform on Beethoven's own instrument. Maria Semple wrote for TV shows such as Saturday Night Live and Arrested Development before she turned to novels, including Where'd You Go, Bernadette, which was shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction in 2013. She discusses Today Will Be Different which follows one disastrous day in the life of a middle-aged woman. Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: