Front Row: Archive 2011

With Kirsty Lang.

The first series of The Killing, the 20 part Danish crime drama, was widely acclaimed as a TV highlight of the year. Now Detective Inspector Sarah Lund returns with a new investigation. With a double-bill of the first two episodes of the second series being screened this weekend, writer John Harvey reflects on the appeal of this crime marathon.

Perrier Award-winner Sean Hughes reveals why he decided to discuss his father's death in his new stand-up show. The comedian, writer and former Never Mind The Buzzcocks captain considers our reactions to death, and recalls his original route into comedy.

The AIDS epidemic of the early 80s in San Francisco is the subject of a new documentary by the film-maker David Weissman. Five individuals who lived through it look back at a period when thousands of their friends were dying of a disturbing and unfamiliar illness. David Weissman discusses why he felt now was the right time to make his film We Were Here.

A new bargain box set of music by jazz saxophonist Joe Harriott places him back in the spotlight, almost four decades after his death. Jamaican-born Harriott made Britain his home, and argued strongly that musicians here should not feel overshadowed by American stars. Kevin LeGendre looks back at his career.

Producer Claire Bartleet.

With Mark Lawson.

Joanna Lumley and Robert Lindsay star in Trevor Nunn's new production of The Lion in Winter, taking the roles made famous by Katharine Hepburn and Peter O'Toole in the 1968 film, the tale of a dysfunctional family Christmas with the Plantaganets. Kathryn Hughes reviews.

America Ferrera, the star of TV show Ugly Betty, discusses making her British stage debut as the alluring publicity-seeker Roxy Hart in the musical Chicago. She also reflects on her famous TV role, and how she prepared for it.

Welsh composer Paul Mealor received an unexpected boost to his career when his choral piece Ubi Caritas was chosen to be performed at the Royal Wedding earlier this year. He discusses how Ubi Caritas started life as a secular rather than a sacred piece, and why he wasn't in Westminster Abbey on day itself, despite receiving a much-coveted invitation.

Producer Jerome Weatherald.

With Mark Lawson.

Sir Terence Conran, designer, restaurateur and founder of the Habitat chain, celebrated his 80th birthday last month, and tomorrow sees the opening of a major retrospective at the Design Museum in London. The Way We Live Now explores Conran's impact, legacy and approach to design. He discusses his career from post-war austerity through to the present day, and the moment he first realised British design needed an urgent overhaul.

Front Row announces the shortlists for the 2011 Costa Book Awards. The awards recognise the 'most enjoyable' books in five categories - First Novel, Novel, Biography, Poetry and Children's Book - published in the last year by writers based in the UK and Ireland. Gaby Wood of The Daily Telegraph and Alex Clark of The Observer give their response to the shortlisted books and writers.

The independent American film Welcome to the Rileys boasts a cast including Oscar winner Melissa Leo, James Gandolfini from The Sopranos, and Kristen Stewart from the Twilight films. She plays a New Orleans stripper befriended by a grieving Gandolfini. Matt Thorne reviews.

Producer Claire Bartleet.

With Mark Lawson.

Playwright and film director Neil LaBute discusses his new play Reasons to be Pretty, starring Billie Piper, which asks if conventional beauty can be a curse.

Writer Ian Rankin reviews two new TV shows which focus on undercover operators: Confessions of an Undercover Cop, and Double Agent: The Eddie Chapman Story.

In his new film Justice, Nicolas Cage plays a man who enlists the services of a vigilante group to settle the score after his wife is assaulted. Dreda Say Mitchell reviews.

Although the sales of vinyl records are rising again, the days when every high street boasted a shop filled with LPs and singles are long gone. David Hepworth recalls the vanishing pleasures offered by record shops.

Producer Jerome Weatherald.

With Kirsty Lang.

Pan Am, a new American TV drama, lands on BBC Two next week. The series follows the lives and loves of a group of air hostesses in the early 1960s, who are apparently empowered by their new profession. Janet Street Porter reviews.

Songs of War is a new disc by award-winning British baritone Simon Keenlyside, featuring his personal selection of music by composers including Ralph Vaughan Williams, George Butterworth and Kurt Weill. He explains why some of his choices may come as a surprise.

Remembrance Day is a fitting release-date for new British horror film The Awakening, starring Rebecca Hall and Dominic West. It's set in the years immediately after the First World War, when many of the bereaved sought solace in spiritualism. Professor Steven Connor gives his verdict.

A photograph of the Rhine by Andreas Gursky has fetched $4.3m (£2.7m) in an auction, setting a new world record for photography. Art market watcher Sarah Thornton explains why photographs are becoming the art market's hottest property.

The Caine Prize-winning Kenyan author Binyavanga Wainaina has published One Day I Will Write About This Place, a memoir of his middle-class childhood in Kenya. He reflects on growing up in a country whose literature was, he argues, stuck in a colonial time-warp.

Producer Georgia Mann.

With Mark Lawson.

Michael Sheen stars in the Young Vic's new production of Hamlet. Director Ian Rickson sets the play in the Elsinore Mental Asylum, an institution the audience must also check in to. Hermione Lee reviews.

Kelvin Mackenzie, former editor of The Sun, gives the critical verdict on Tabloid: a new documentary charting the way British newspapers covered the extraordinary tale of Joyce McKinney, a US beauty queen accused of imprisoning a young Mormon missionary in 1977.

Jeffrey Eugenides, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex, talks about his long- awaited third novel: The Marriage Plot. He discusses how this novel is born of a previous abandoned book, and how a friendly competition with fellow American author Jonathan Franzen has spurred him on throughout his career.

The British Library's collection of medieval and Renaissance illuminated manuscripts are on display together for the first time. The manuscripts were collected over 800 years by Kings and Queens of England. Writer A N Wilson reviews the exhibition.

Producer Ellie Bury.

With John Wilson.

Johnny Depp's latest cinematic tribute to Hunter S Thompson, The Rum Diary, is based on the late journalist's novel of the same name. The semi-autobiographical story follows the boozy and increasingly unhinged exploits of a young American reporter in Puerto Rico in the late 1950s. Iain Sinclair reviews.

Musician, songwriter and producer Nile Rodgers first found fame with his band Chic, before working with Diana Ross, David Bowie, Madonna and many more. He reflects on his unconventional childhood and the unexpected starting points for some of his most popular songs.

Viking gods, murderous giants, monsters and magical transformations provide the raw material for the new novels by Horrid Henry author Francesca Simon and by Joanne Harris, the writer of the bestselling Chocolat. They discuss why Norse mythology still inspires 21st century writers.

Producer LISA DAVIS

With Mark Lawson.

As queues form for the largest-ever show of Leonardo da Vinci's paintings at the National Gallery, artist Tom Phillips reviews and considers whether the exhibition justifies the hype.

At just 33, Maltese singer Joseph Calleja is tipped as one of the most promising tenors of the 21st century. He talks about his new album and his singing ambitions.

Linguistics specialist David Crystal has selected 100 words which he feels best illustrate the huge variety of sources and events which have shaped the English language. He elaborates on some of his choices, showing how, for example, hello is a relatively new invention - whereas unfriend is nothing like as modern as we think.

Producer Lisa Davis.

With Mark Lawson.

Andrea Arnold's latest film is a re-telling of Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. The director of Red Road and Fish Tank cast mainly non-professional actors in the film, which aims to escape the conventions of a costume drama. Sarah Crompton reviews.

Oscar-nominated screenwriter Peter Morgan returns to TV with a second series of the legal drama The Jury, nine years after the original series was aired. Morgan, whose credits include The Queen and Frost/Nixon, discusses why he favours writing for TV over cinema, the pressures of writing about living people and a letter he received from Tony Blair.

The Royal Artillery Memorial at Hyde Park Corner, created by Charles Sargeant Jagger, was unveiled in 1925 and features a larger-than-life howitzer carved from Portland stone, standing on a large plinth surrounded by four bronze figures of artillery men. Richard Cork visits the newly-restored memorial ahead of Remembrance Sunday, and re-assesses the power of Jagger's work.

Best-selling crime novelist Peter James talks about his latest book, Perfect People, a thriller set in the pioneering world of gene manipulation. As he explains, though this may sound like science-fiction, genetic planning is already possible to some extent - and so his book also explores the ethics of creating designer babies.

Producer Katie Langton.

With Kirsty Lang.

Singer Michael Stipe and bassist Mike Mills from the band REM discuss what it feels like to 'call it a day as a band' after 30 years, 15 studio albums and 85 million albums sold. They reflect on their career in the light of a new retrospective double album called REM, Part Lies, Part Heart, Part Truth, Part Garbage, 1982-2011.

Artists including Tracey Emin, Rachel Whiteread, Howard Hodgkin and Martin Creed have created posters for the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics, unveiled today. Three of the artists reveal their inspirations, and Waldemar Januszczak discusses whether the new posters are winners.

In a time of austerity, the TV schedules still find space for programmes about the super-rich. Boyd Hilton assesses the appeal of shows such as Billion $$ Girl, about the daughter of F1 chief Bernie Ecclestone, and Keeping Up With The Kardashians.

Producer Philippa Ritchie.