Front Row: Archive 2014

Line of Duty's Adrian Dunbar discusses directing Samuel Beckett's 1982 one-act play Catastrophe at the Happy Days Enniskillen International Beckett Festival; violinist Tasmin Little selects her sounds of the summer; Jenny McCartney reviews Michel Gondry's new film Mood Indigo starring Audrey Tautou, and artist Katie Paterson on her ambitious project to send a meteorite back into space.

Producer: Jerome Weatherald

Gillian Anderson stars in a new production of A Streetcar Named Desire at the Young Vic Theatre in London, which Matt Wolf reviews. Composer Gabriel Prokofiev and violinist Daniel Hope discuss their collaboration for tonight's Prom which features the world premiere of Gabriel's Violin Concerto 1914. Kate Mossman evokes the pop songs that conjure up summer. And the crime reporters who turn to crime novel-writing: Laura Lippman, former crime reporter at the Baltimore Sun and David Mark, former crime reporter at the Yorkshire Evening Post, discuss how their new careers in crime fiction have been influenced by their former trade.

Gareth Malone and Adrian Sutton discuss Sunday's Prom which takes World War One as its theme. Gareth's Military Wives choir will be performing and Adrian Sutton talks about his War Horse Suite which he's composed from his score for the original theatre production. Bel Mooney reviews In The Club, a new BBC drama series written and directed by Kay Mellor, which follows the lives of a group of friends who have met at an antenatal class. Neil Bartlett talks about his latest novel The Disappearance Boy, set in the world of 1950s Variety. And poet Michael Symmons Roberts chooses three poems that evoke summer for him.

Julian Lloyd Webber tells Kirsty Lang about his future plans, after being forced to retire due to a neck injury.

Andrew Graham-Dixon on his new TV series The Art Of China - which explores China's artistic heritage and the way contact with the West transformed Chinese art.

Jennifer Haley talks about her award winning play The Nether - a disturbing work about the internet and personal responsibility in virtual worlds.

And The Galapagos Affair - an incredible true-life 1930s murder mystery set on the Pacific islands.

Tonight's Front Row celebrates the return of giant puppets to Liverpool. This time, the little girl and her dog are joined by her grandmother: Kirsty Lang finds out about the threesome, and how Liverpool council copes with turning the city-centre into a giant's performance-space.

Chair of the judges A C Grayling and his fellow judge Erica Wagner join John Wilson to discuss the longlist for this years' Man Booker Prize. It's the first time that American novelists have been eligible for this prestigious award, and four of the listed writers are American.

Billy Elliot writer Lee Hall talks about creating a stage play out of the Oscar winning film Shakespeare in Love. Hall also reveals that he's been busy reading Elton John's personal diaries in preparation for making a biopic of the singer.

Tonight's Front Row features the first joint performance, in the studio, by two leading figures in world music. Dom Flemons - co-founder of the Carolina Chocolate Drops - and Martin Simpson - renowned acoustic and slide guitarist - have been researching and exploring how folk songs travelled back and forth between England and North America, changing shape as they journeyed. They retraced the fieldwork done by folklorist Cecil Sharp, a hundred years ago - and give John a musical demonstration of how an English dancehall ballad became a ragtime blues number.

Image: Shakespeare In Love - Company with Tom Bateman as Will. Photo by Johan Persson (c) Disney.

In tonight's Front Row: Judith Weir talks to John Wilson about being appointed Master Of The Queen's Music, and Eamonn Holmes - Manchester United superfan - reviews the film, Believe, about Sir Matt Busby's last great coaching challenge.

With Samira Ahmed. Nicolas Cage's new film is Joe - about an ex-con who becomes an unlikely father-figure to a troubled fifteen year old boy. Mark Eccleston reviews.

David Eldridge talks about his epic play Holy Warriors (at Shakespeares Globe), which looks at the struggle for Jerusalem.

Carole Cerasi introduces Samira to Bach's favourite instrument, the Clavichord.

And the objects created by political activists in a new exhibition at the V&A.

Presenter: John Wilson

Actress Rebecca Hall discusses new film A Promise and explains why she'd love to be cast in a singing part. Also conductor Long Yu on bringing a Chinese orchestra to the Proms for the first time, and the National Theatre's Ben Power on adapting Medea and attracting new audiences. Finally, as the Commonwealth Games Festival gets under way this weekend, artist Phil Collins explains what he's doing to kick it off.

Artistic duo Gilbert & George on their provocative exhibition, Scapegoating Pictures, and why they think religion should be banned.

Author and Coronation Street writer Jonathan Harvey on his new novel, The Girl Who Just Appeared, set amidst the searing tension of the Toxteth Riots.

As the Chichester Festival Theatre prepares to re-open its doors tonight after a £22m refurbishment - with Rupert Everett in Amadeus - the theatre's Artistic Director Jonathan Church and architect Steve Tompkins discuss their vision for the 1960s brutalist concrete hexagon.

And why a new 'memoir' about Harper Lee has forced the famously reclusive author back in to the public limelight.

Photo Credit: Ben Westoby.