Front Row: Archive 2013

With John Wilson.

American film-maker Alex Gibney won the 2008 Best Documentary Oscar for Taxi To The Dark Side - about the American government's use of torture. He talks to John about Julian Assange, the subject of his latest film, We Steal Secrets: The Story Of Wikileaks, and reveals that his next project is about the disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong.

Amy Winehouse's personal pictures, outfits, record collection and items from her school days are in a new exhibition co-curated by her brother Alex. As the second anniversary of her death approaches, Rosie Swash assesses what this exhibition reveals about the singer, and considers her posthumous influence on fashion, writers and other musicians, including Patti Smith and Green Day.

Amanda Levete, the architect whose buildings include the Media Centre at Lord's Cricket Ground and the Selfridges Department Store in Birmingham, chooses a house - Casa Malaparte on Capri - for her Cultural Exchange. She explains how the unusual building, which is on an isolated cliff top on the Italian island, captured her imagination.

Stories We Tell is a new documentary from Oscar-nominated director Sarah Polley. The film follows Polley, through interviews with her family members and old friends, as she attempts to find out the truth about her biological father. The genre-bending documentary investigates narrative, the nature of story-telling and the complexity of family relations. Briony Hanson reviews.

With John Wilson.

Mary, Queen of Scots: betrayed Catholic martyr or murdering adulteress? A new exhibition at the National Museums of Scotland in Edinburgh re-examines Mary Stewart through portraits, documents, jewellery and furniture. Poet and dramatist Liz Lochhead - whose play, Mary Queen Of Scots Got Her Head Chopped Off, looked at the relationship between Mary and Elizabeth I - reviews the exhibition.

Film director Mike Figgis is best-known for Timecode and Leaving Las Vegas, for which he was nominated for an Oscar. His latest project is Suspension Of Disbelief, a noir thriller which focuses on the art of film-making and narrative. He discusses storytelling in cinema, the current state of the UK film industry and his experiences directing James Gandolfini on the set of The Sopranos.

Front Row pays tribute to stage designer Mark Fisher, who completely transformed the way that rock shows took place, and designed for The Rolling Stones, U2, Peter Gabriel and Pink Floyd, as well as for the Beijing and London Olympics, and the Queen's Diamond Jubilee concert.

Oscar-nominated actress Marianne Jean-Baptiste, currently starring in The Amen Corner at the National Theatre, reveals her choice for Cultural Exchange: jazz trumpeter Miles Davis's influential album, Kind Of Blue.

Producer Rebecca Nicholson.

With Mark Lawson.

Natalie Haynes reviews the new West End stage musical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, directed by Sam Mendes, and starring Douglas Hodge as Willy Wonka.

The Chancellor George Osborne today announced a 7% cut in the Department of Culture, Media and Sport's budget, and a 5% cut to budgets for arts organisations, as part of the government's spending review. Broadcaster Janet Street-Porter, music commentator Norman Lebrecht and Richard Mantle of Opera North suggest areas of the arts which they believe should receive less funding.

The playwright and screenwriter Lee Hall selects his Cultural Exchange. He explains why Briggflatts, an autobiographical poem by Basil Bunting, has revealed new layers of meaning over the 30 years that he has been re-reading it.

The concert promoter AEG has been warned by the Advertising Standards Authority after they described a Kanye West gig as a "one off" London show, only to announce more dates. Lawyer Duncan Lamont discusses the legal issues around advertising "one offs" and "farewell tours."

Producer: Olivia Skinner.

With Mark Lawson,

For the first time, three Vermeer paintings of female musicians are on show together at the National Gallery, London. They form the centrepiece of a new exhibition examining music as a motif in Dutch painting of the 17th Century. Composer Michael Berkeley considers the various roles played by musical instruments in the art of that period.

For many writers working in TV drama, the trickiest things they have to deal with are the notes from the producers. At their worst, such notes can confuse and undermine a writer's vision. At their best, they can help a writer to see a better way of telling the story. Peter Bowker, writer of Blackpool, Desperate Romantics and Monroe, and Patrick Spence, the executive producer on Murphy's Law, Lilies, and Hancock and Joan, reflect on the best and the worst notes writers receive.

As Wimbledon gets under way, Ed Smith reviews two tennis documentary films. Venus and Serena shows the lives of the champion sisters as children, in their shared home and battling illness in 2011. The Battle of the Sexes, which takes its title from the famous 1973 match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs, explores the relationship between women's professional tennis and the Women's Liberation movement.

For Cultural Exchange, the pianist Mitsuko Uchida selects Piero della Francesca's Resurrection. She explains how she was inspired by Piero della Francesca's fresco and why great art, whether music or painting, does not have to be technically perfect.

Producer Claire Bartleet.

With Mark Lawson.

Lowry and the Painting of Modern Life, a new exhibition at Tate Britain, compares Lancashire born artist L S Lowry with the French tradition of the time and argues for his pre-eminence as a painter of the industrial city. Rachel Cooke reviews.

The writer Jonathan Dee, whose novel The Privileges was shortlisted for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, discusses his latest work. A Thousand Pardons explores what it means to apologise and the tradition of apology and forgiveness in public life. Jonathan Dee talks about receiving an angry e-mail from a reader shocked by the novel's dramatic twist.

This is the End is the latest collaboration from Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen, following Superbad and Pineapple Express. It's set at a glamorous party, where James Franco, Seth Rogen and Jonah Hill play versions of themselves, with cameos from stars including Rihanna and Emma Watson. The festivities are in full swing when the apocalypse arrives. Viv Groskop reviews.

The writer Brian Aldiss, best known for his science fiction, chooses his Cultural Exchange. He explains how The Journal of Marie Bashkirtseff, the diary of a young artist written between 1860 and 1884, influenced him when he discovered it as a young boy.

Scared To Get Happy is a 5 CD, 134 track box set which charts the history of indie music from 1980 to 1990. An exhaustive collection, it includes tracks from famous names such as The Stone Roses, Primal Scream and Lloyd Cole and the Commotions as well as less familiar groups like Trixie's Big Red Motorbike and Tallulah Gosh, featuring 2013 Turner Prize winner Elizabeth Price. Andrew Collins traces the sound that defined a generation.

Producer: Olivia Skinner.

With John Wilson.

Disco legend, music producer and Oscar-winner Giorgio Moroder is the man behind hits from Donna Summer, The Three Degrees and Sparks. In a rare interview, Moroder reflects on his humble beginnings, his rise to fame and his recent comeback with Daft Punk.

As Roger Hiorns' blue crystal sculpture Seizure is moved from a derelict council flat in south London to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, artist Richard Wilson and critic Rachel Campbell-Johnston consider the importance of site-specific art and what happens when an installation is transferred to an environment other than its original location.

Tim Firth, writer of the stage version of Calendar Girls - one of the most successful plays in recent British theatre - has turned his hand to a musical. The result is This Is My Family, which explores family life from the perspective of a 13 year old girl, and opens this week in Sheffield. Tim Firth and Daniel Evans, artistic director of Sheffield Theatres, discuss the project.

For Cultural Exchange, Francine Stock chooses The Apple, a film made by Iranian director Samira Makhmalbaf in 1998, when she was only 18 years old.

Producer Jerome Weatherald.

With Mark Lawson

The business side of aviation and the logistics of the industry are the focus of a series of TV documentaries this week. The bosses of easyJet and Ryanair reveal their business models tonight in Flights and Fights: Inside the Low-Cost Airlines, and Airport Live concludes with its final report from Heathrow. Henry Sutton, whose novels include Flying, reviews both.

Northern Irish novelist Glenn Patterson selects his Cultural Exchange, the 1942 film Yankee Doodle Dandy starring James Cagney, about the life of the renowned musical composer, playwright, actor, dancer and singer George M. Cohan.

Tomorrow the Royal & Derngate theatre in Northampton will open an art house cinema named after Hollywood screen icon Errol Flynn. Flynn, who was born in Australia, became famous in the 1930s for playing swashbuckler roles in films including The Adventures of Robin Hood, Captain Blood and The Sea Hawk. But the actor spent his early acting career with the Northampton Repertory Company. Mark visits the Errol Flynn Filmhouse to talk to Royal & Derngate Chief Executive Martin Sutherland and Errol Flynn biographer Gerry Connelly to find out more about the actor's connection to the town.

David Edgar's new play If Only imagines what will happen to the coalition in 2014. He tells Mark what will happen to his play if life mirrors art.

Producer Stephen Hughes.

With John Wilson.

Lenny Henry returns to the stage after a succesful run playing Othello. He now stars in the Pulitzer prize-winning play Fences by American playwright August Wilson. Lenny Henry discusses the importance of the play and the challenge of memorising his lines in a role where he's rarely off the stage.

The winner of the CILIP Kate Greenaway Medal for children's book illustration is announced today. Previous winners include Raymond Briggs, Shirley Hughes, Lauren Child and Quentin Blake. John talks to this year's winner.

The foghorn is a disappearing sound from the British coastline - increasingly made redundant by the advances of GPS technology. Now an ambitious project is using GPS technology in the service of a Foghorn Requiem. Composed by Orlando Gough, the requiem features three brass bands, a flotilla of vessels positioned offshore, and the Souter Lighthouse Foghorn itself. Composer Orlando Gough and artist Lise Autogena discuss a one-off musical performance that aims to fuse the sounds from land and sea.

In tonight's Cultural Exchange, Joan Bakewell discusses her choice - Luchino Visconti's sumptuous 1963 film adaptation of di Lampedusa's novel The Leopard.

With Mark Lawson

Before Midnight is the last instalment in the acclaimed film trilogy that began with Before Sunset and continued with Before Sunrise. Jesse and Celine, who enjoyed brief encounters in Vienna and Paris, are now married with children, but as their summer holiday in Greece comes to an end, the light seems to be going out of their relationship. Antonia Quirke delivers her verdict on one of modern cinema's most famous and enduring couples, played by Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke.

Neil Hannon (frontman and founder of The Divine Comedy) and musician Thomas Walsh discuss their second cricket-inspired album Sticky Wickets, and the formation of their band The Duckworth Lewis Method. They also reveal how they arranged special guests including Daniel Radcliffe, Stephen Fry and Henry Blofeld.

The Weir, a series of ghost stories told in an Irish pub, was a huge hit for playwright Conor McPherson over a decade ago. His latest play The Night Alive returns to the theme of how the past can haunt the present in unexpected ways. Conor McPherson talks to Mark about the experiences that have informed his writing.

Artist Rachel Whiteread makes her selection for the Cultural Exchange - a painting by Bridget Riley, which she kept as a postcard.

With Mark Lawson.

Daniel Radcliffe discusses playing the title role of Billy in the darkly comic stage play The Cripple of Inishmaan by Martin McDonagh (writer and director of In Bruges). Radcliffe describes the challenges of taking on a distinct west coast Irish accent and portraying someone with severe disabilities, who wants to leave his remote island home when a Hollywood film crew comes to town. The actor also talks about his career choices post-Harry Potter and a potential return to his famous role, why he expects people to dislike him, and whether he would want to take the lead in Doctor Who.

Adapted from Max Brooks' novel with the same name, World War Z is the latest zombie apocalypse film. It stars Brad Pitt as Gerry Lane, a United Nations investigator who travels the world to try work out a cure for the zombie pandemic. Jenny McCartney gives her verdict.

Neil Gaiman, whose books include Stardust and Coraline, chooses a work by the Victorian artist Richard Dadd - The Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke - painted whilst Dadd was incarcerated at Bedlam hospital.

Produced by Kate Bullivant.