Front Row

Ben Okri's new play Changing Destiny is an adaptation of one of the world's oldest known stories, the ancient Egyptian Tale of Sinuhe. Tonight marks not only its opening night at London's Young Vic theatre, but the first time the venue has opened its doors since last year. Artistic director Kwame Kwei-Armah, who directs the play, talks to Tom live from the Young Vic just a few minutes before the curtain goes up.

This evening, Sir James MacMillan has a new piece being premiered at the First Night of the Proms, alongside Vaughan Williams's Serenade to Music. He tells Tom why it will be such a special occasion, and the pressure of writing a piece to accompany a masterwork.

"Paint me, Joan," the children of the tenements of Townhead in Glasgow used to say to Joan Eardley. And she did. The people of Townhead and scenes of the fishing village of Catterline in northeast Scotland became the focus of her art. This is celebrated in her centenary year with two exhibitions in Edinburgh, where the Art Festival opened yesterday. Glasgow-based artist Hannah Tuulikki and Adam Benmakhlouf, art editor of The Skinny magazine, review the Joan Eardley shows, as well as Tak' Tent O' Time Ere Time Be Tint, a new installation and film by Sean Lynch, responding to the statues and public monuments of Edinburgh.

Laura Snapes joins us to review Billie Eilish's eagerly awaited new album Happier Than Ever. And as ITV announces it has axed The X Factor, she discusses its legacy and why Simon Cowell is now choosing to distance himself from the programme.

Geeta Pendse visits the new Museum of Making in Derby - an £18 million redevelopment that celebrates the city's 300-year industrial heritage.

Jamie Thrasivoulou, Derby County Football Club's Poet-In-Residence, shares what it's like to perform a poem to a stadium of roaring football fans.

The writer Mahsuda Snaith discusses her flash fiction written in response to Kedleston Hall as part of the National Trust's Colonial Countryside project.

BBC Derby's Martin Williams learns how to create a Map of Curiousity at the Museum of Making.

Presenter: Geeta Pendse

Tokyo: Art & Photography at The Ashmolean in Oxford is a celebration of the city currently hosting the Olympics. The exhibition’s curator Lena Fritsch discusses the show which spans the arts of the Edo period (1603-1868) when the country was officially closed to the outside world, to today, and considers the sprawling metropolis’s appetite for the new and innovative.

Comedy series Ted Lasso revolves around the eponymous American football coach who, fish-out-of-water, comes to London to coach a fictional football team. Its uncynical, warm-and-fuzzy feel has resounded with audiences, and writer Brett Goldstein, who stars as footballer Roy Kent, and co-star Nick Mohammed (kit-man Nathan) join Tom to discuss the show’s slow burn with audiences, the meaning of football, and how to avoid mawkishness in a show which makes a feature of “niceness”.

Returning for its third year, the Wellcome Photography Prize tells provocative visual stories about the health challenges of our time, combatting taboos, bringing complex medical issues to life and showing how health affects society. Jameisha Prescod, the 2021 winner of the £10,000 single image prize, joins Tom to discuss her work.

Presenter Tom Sutcliffe

As a 3.5 metre tall puppet called Little Amal begins an 8,000km journey from Turkey to Manchester to highlight the difficulties faced by refugee children, Samira talks to theatre director and producer David Lan live from Gaziantep on the Turkish-Syrian border about ambitious artistic project The Walk.

The longlist for the 2021 Booker Prize has been announced and we discuss the 13 chosen novels with Sameer Rahim from Prospect Magazine and Claire Armitstead from The Guardian. Are these the right titles? And who might be the eventual winner of the £50,000 prize?

Tomorrow the David Livingstone Birthplace re-opens following a £9.1m regeneration plan. The museum has not been simply refurbished, the story it tells of the famous explorer, the first European to see the Victoria Falls, has been revised. Zimbabwean novelist Petina Gappah, who spent years researching and writing about Livingstone, tells Samira Ahmed how she has given voice to those who worked with him and whom he met on his expeditions.

Presenter: Samira Ahmed

Five years after Prince's death, the musician's music director of over 20 years, Morris Hayes, discusses Prince's posthumous new album Welcome 2 America. Recorded in 2010 and archived in the singer's legendary vault of unreleased material, it is released this week.

Freya McClements, Northern Correspondent with The Irish Times, joins John to discuss the decision from the Northern Ireland Executive to reopen the nation's theatres and concert halls.

Ben Sharrock's new film Limbo follows a group of men as they await the results of their asylum claims on a remote Scottish island. The film earned two BAFTA nominations and eight nominations at the British Independent Film Awards, including one for lead actor Amir El-Masry. Amir talks to John about playing Syrian musician Omar in the film, as well as being inspired to act by Omar Sharif, and his work to improve representation of Arab and Muslim people on screens.

Presenter: John Wilson

Playwright April De Angelis joins Tom to talk about her new musical Gin Craze! Described as 'a booze soaked love ballad from the women of Gin Lane.'

The Tokyo Olympics 2020 Opening Ceremony took place earlier today, a year later than planned, in the wake of a number of controversies, not least the sacking of the Artistic Director the day before the event. For our Friday Review, Japan specialists Sakiko Nishihara and Christopher Harding give their views on the background to the ceremony and the event itself.

Novelist Jordan Tannahill tells ue about his new novel exploring the fine lines between faith, conspiracy and mania in contemporary America, The Listeners. While lying in bed next to her husband one night, Claire Devon hears a low hum that he cannot. And, it seems, no one else can either. This innocuous noise begins causing Claire headaches, nosebleeds and insomnia, gradually upsetting the balance of her life.

And a new report, Boundless Creativity, is intended as a roadmap for cultural and creative recovery, renewal and growth after the pandemic. What lessons have been learnt about how the arts can reach audiences both online and off? What do the arts need to bounce back? We talk to Lord Neil Mendoza, Commissioner for Cultural Recovery and Renewal about this collaboration between the DCMS and the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe

Main image: Gin Craze! at the Royal & Derngate Theatre, Northampton

Susannah Clapp, theatre critic of The Observer reviews the new age-blind production of Hamlet starring Ian McKellen, which officially opened up at the Theatre Royal Windsor last night, 50 years since the 82-year-old actor first played the part.

The Mercury Prize nominees were announced today. Laura Snapes gives us her thoughts on the list, what it tells us about music over the past year, and makes her prediction for who will win.

The historian and screenwriter Alex von Tunzelmann has turned her attention to the deeply contested subject of statues. She joins Samira to discuss her new book, Fallen Idols, which shows that the erection and toppling of statues has been a perennial hot topic across the world.

American musician Jon Batiste has many strings to his bow – he’s an activist, recording artist, band leader for a daily TV late night chat show, a singer, pianist and an Oscar-winning film composer. Batiste discusses his new album, We Are, as well as his Broadway musical about Jean-Michel Basquiat, and An American Symphony being performed at Carnegie Hall next year.

Art critic Louisa Buck assesses this year's Art Fund Museum of the Year 2021 shortlist which was announced today. Despite being closed for most of the year, five galleries and museums across the UK have been rewarded as contenders for the prestigious £100,000 award, the world's largest museum prize.

Yesterday in Berlin saw the opening of The Humboldt Forum, the largest cultural development in Europe and the most ambitious in Germany this century. It has cost 700m Euros, covers 44,000 square metres, and even before the foundation stone was laid in 2013, it’s been mired in controversy. We speak with Rüdiger Schaper, Head of Culture for Tagesspiegel newspaper about its significance for Germany.

Presenter Tom Sutcliffe

Main image: Jon Batiste

Ivorian director Philippe Lacôte talks about his film Night of the Kings, set in a notorious Abidjan prison run by the inmates, in which he explores the West African tradition of the griot or storyteller.

Presenter: Kirsty Lang

Chart-topping New York post-punk group Blondie have more than 40 years of chart success under their belts and in 2019 they decided to travel to play some concerts in Havana Cuba. We speak with singer Debbie Harry about the warmth of the reception they received, about integrating local styles and musicians in their set and much more. A new EP is about to be released which shows the fruits of their labour.

This Friday marks 10 years since Amy Winehouse died. In a new film 'Reclaiming Amy' to be shown on BBC Two, director Marina Parker spoke to her friends and her mum Janis to get their side of her story, and how Amy's life and death affected them. She explains to John about working with them and showing the world a different side of the singer.

Natalie Williams and Troy Miller both worked with Amy Winehouse. They delve into her musicianship and reassess her legacy as a singer, jazz musician and song writer.