Front Row

Suzannah Lipscomb (Chair of Costa Biography Award) announces the category winners of the five 2019 Costa Book Awards exclusively on Front Row and Stig talks live to the winner of the Best Biography.

Twenty years after the success of his debut film American Beauty, Sam Mendes has once again taken the top prize at the Golden Globes with his First World War epic 1917. He explains how his grandfather’s experience as a messenger on the Western Front inspired the film, which is filmed as if it’s one continuous shot.

Presenter Stig Abell

Hugh Grant and Matthew McConaughey discuss working with Guy Ritchie on his new gangster film The Gentlemen, but never actually sharing a scene.

Television writer Daisy Coulam, whose credits include Grantchester, Humans and Lost in Paradise, talks to Nikki Bedi about Deadwater Fell, her new crime drama for Channel 4 starring David Tennant, which explores the impact the murder of a mother and her three children has on the small Scottish town where they lived.

The American writer Bill Bryson discusses his love of the aesthetics and culture of English churches, and Australian photographer Cameron Newham describes his project to photograph in detail every one of the more than 10,000 parish churches in England.

Presenter Nikki Bedi

Taika Waititi’s new film Jojo Rabbit is a satire about a 10-year-old budding Nazi who falls under the spell of his imaginary friend Adolf Hitler, played by the New Zealand writer and director. Jason Solomons reviews the film which also stars Scarlett Johansson, Stephen Merchant and first-time child actor Roman Griffin Davis who has been nominated for a Golden Globe.

Alex Michaelides is the author of The Silent Patient, a twisty thriller that has become the biggest selling fiction debut of 2019 internationally and has been optioned by Brad Pitt’s film company. He discusses his love of Agatha Christie, the influence of psychology and Greek myth on his story, and the silencing of women.

Damage to artworks, photographs and documents from exposure to light is something to which galleries and archivists have to give serious consideration. Samira visits The National Archives at Kew to find out how they measure and assess the fragility of individual works, and speaks to Dr Lora Angelova, Head of Conservation Research, and Conservator Emilie Cloos about how best to protect and display vulnerable artefacts.

Presenter: Samira Ahmed

Main Image: Jojo Rabbit featuring Taika Waititi and Roman Griffin Davis. Photograph: Kimberley French / Twentieth Century Fox

A celebration of Ludwig van Beethoven, marking the composer's 250th anniversary year.

To discuss what sets Beethoven apart from other composers, John Wilson is joined by pianist Stephen Hough, poet Ruth Padel, Oxford Professor of Music Laura Tunbridge and conductor Sir Simon Rattle, who says of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony: "It is too much of everything!... this is a composer inventing the music of the next one hundred years"

Throughout 2020 Simon Rattle will be conducting Beethoven with the London Symphony Orchestra, starting in January with Symphonies 7 and 9 and the rarely performed Oratorio, Christ on the Mount of Olives.

Stephen Hough's recording of the complete Beethoven Piano Concertos will be released later this year, as will Laura Tunbridge's major biography of the composer.

Ruth Padel's collection Beethoven Variations: Poems on a Life is published at the end of January.

Radio 3 is celebrating Beethoven’s 250th anniversary with a year-long series, Beethoven Unleashed, launching on 13 January with Composer of the Week.

Presenter: John Wilson

Writer Juno Dawson, critic Sarah Crompton, comedian Ayesha Hazarika and folk musician Matthew Crampton battle it out to see who'll be crowned champion in our cultural quiz of the year. Plus, as it's wassailing season, Matthew discusses the history of drinking songs and plays some examples.

Presenter: Stig Abell

How has TV changed in the last decade, from what we watch to how we watch it. Critics Boyd Hilton and Eleanor Stanford discuss, alongside contributions from screen writers Mark Gatiss, Amanda Coe and Mike Bartlett.

Male ballet dancers Ty Singleton and Tom Rogers on how they hope their podcast, Ty and Tom Talk, will change perceptions of ballet.

Chinese film Long Day's Journey into Night is reviewed by actor and filmmaker Daniel York Loh.

Rock critic David Hepworth pays tribute to former Bonzo Dog Doo Dah band member Neil Innes who was also in Monty Python films and The Rutles.

Presenter: Samira Ahmed

The most recent statistics released by the Church of England reveal record cathedral attendance, despite falling numbers in many Anglican parish churches. Cathedrals are increasingly programming cultural events and art installations as a way of engaging with wider communities. We discuss the evolving role of contemporary art in churches as well as different approaches to conserve the art that already exists within them. With author and former chairman of the National Trust Simon Jenkins; Becky Clark, director of Cathedral and Church Buildings for the Church of England; Peter Walker, artist-in-residence at Lichfield Cathedral, and Rachel Turnbull, Senior Collections Conservator at English Heritage.

We also hear from British-Ghanaian artist Larry Achiampong, who explains how his childhood churchgoing experiences to Pentecostal and Catholic churches have inspired his video art installation Sunday’s Best.

Presenter: Samira Ahmed

A sparkling and razor-sharp conversation marks the end of a remarkable year for two authors.

Queenie has been one of the breakthrough novels of the year, winning over readers with its compassionate and funny depiction of a young black woman whose life seems to be spinning out of control. Front Row asked its author, Candice Carty-Williams, to choose a cultural figure she’d like to talk to. She selected fellow novelist Bernardine Evaristo who this year became the first black woman to win the Booker Prize for Girl, Woman, Other, sharing it with Margaret Atwood. That shared win is part of their discussion as is how to be a literary Instagram influencer, how far the publishing industry is diversifying, and how listening to Beyoncé can ease the stresses of a book tour.

Image: Bernardine Evaristo (Left) and Candice Carty-Williams (Right)

Interviewed guest: Candice Carty-Williams

Producer: Dymphna Flynn

Three names on the Motown label, Holland-Dozier-Holland, were behind a string of hits including 13 number 1s in a row. The songs they wrote included Reach Out (I'll Be There), Stop! in the Name of Love, Where Did Our Love Go? and Baby Love and the artists they composed for ranged from Martha and the Vandellas and Diana Ross and the Supremes to Marvin Gaye and The Four Tops. Now in the 60th anniversary year of Motown and as they publish their autobiography, Come and Get These Memories, the Holland Brothers, Eddie and Brian, join Front Row for an intimate chat by the piano, remembering the creation of some of their greatest hits.

Image: John Wilson with Eddie (Centre) and Brian Holland (Right)

Presenter: John Wilson

Amanda Coe, novelist and screenwriter of Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story, Room at the Top and Apple Tree Yard talks about her latest television drama series, The Trial of Christine Keeler. It's the story of the Profumo Affair and John Wilson asks her what the 1963 scandal tells us about power and sex in today's society.

Novelist Diana Evans discusses Singular, her new short story specially commissioned for Radio 4 which explores the idea of whether happiness is necessarily dependent on companionship.

With all the checks and balances in Hollywood, how do rotten movies ever get made, what makes them so awful, and are some so bad they're good? Film critics Mark Eccleston and Amanny Mohamed discuss the appeal of the turkey.

Presenter John Wilson