New Zealand born Anthony McCarten is arguably the world's best known biopic screenwriter and playwright Past subjects have included Whitney Houston, Edison, Churchill and the band Queen, and this year alone he's had two Broadway productions - the still running Neil Diamond musical A Beautiful Noise and The Collaboration, a play about Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

This morning the Australian government has announced a direct pathway to citizenship for New Zealanders. The announcement comes just ahead of ANZAC Day. We last spoke to ABC chief political correspondent Laura Tingle on Saturday Morning in 2020 under the headline 'What Australia can learn from New Zealand'.

Feedback and responses for listeners 15 April 2023

Sydney-based New Zealander Dr Matt Baker returns for a chat about some of the latest science news. This week: can rats 'bop their heads' to a beat, why pedestrians crossing the road naturally form 'lanes' and we celebrate the 25th anniversary of dinosaurs being known to have feathers. Dr Baker is Scientia Associate Professor in the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Science at the University of New South Wales in Sydney.

Last week we spoke to Michele Leggott about her experiences with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. What we didn't get to talk about was the book and research work Leggott has been working on over this time: her just-released book, Face to the Sky, and the 19th-century New Zealand botanical artist Emily Cumming Harris, which research has recently revealed was also a poet. Harris sheds light on the situation for settler women under military protection in Taranaki . Face to the Sky is Leggott's eleventh collection of poetry. She's a former New Zealand Poet Laureate, co-founder of the New Zealand Electronic Poetry Centre, and a recipient of the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement in Poetry.

You love their work, but are seriously disturbed by what you've learnt about the person - can you separate an artist's work from their personal life? It's a question explored by New York Times writer, essayist and critic Claire Dederer in her book Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma. In the collection of essays Dederer discusses the link between genius and monstrosity in the age of #MeToo. Dederer talks personally about her own dilemmas in admiring problematic artists such as Hemingway, Polanski and Picasso, and how best to navigate the uncomfortable collision of art, ethics and personal values.

In 2015, three British school girls went missing from their London homes, and headed to Syria to join Islamic State. For years their fate was unknown, but after the collapse of the IS caliphate, one of the girls Shamima Begum was sensationally discovered in a camp for IS women and children. Begum came to be seen as a poster girl for terrorism and in 2019 Britain revoked her citizenship - a decision which continues to divide public and political opinion. Investigative BBC journalist Josh Baker travelled to Syria to meet Begum, and traces her journey from London teenager to IS bride in his gripping podcast I'm Not a Monster - the Shamima Begum Story.

This week a celebration was held to mark 100 days until the FIFA Women's World Football Cup kicks off across New Zealand and Australia. If this was the Men's World Cup, would there be more fuss? Inevitably. Women players have been fighting hard for equal pay and recognition. Last month FIFA announced a tripling of prize money this year for Women's World Cup teams and committed to equal World Cup prize pots with men by 2026. Former New Zealand striker Sarah Gregorius says it's a step in the right direction. She's now the Director of Global Policy & Strategic Relations with the players' union FIFPRO in Amsterdam and has been a strong parity advocate for the women's game in New Zealand and on the world stage.

Since controversially mocking vegans in 2018, British food critic William Sitwell has been "nicer" to people with a plant-based diet. The long-term MasterChef judge tells Kim Hill about his own food philosophy and his new book The Restaurant - A History of Eating Out.

A shadowy Russian private military company has been increasingly making its presence felt in Africa. The Wagner Group, often dubbed Putin's private army, has been involved in conflicts in Libya, Sudan, and the Central African Republic. They stand accused of committing human rights abuses and supporting authoritarian regimes. This is in addition to the company having an estimated 50,000 troops fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine. Julia Stanyard, a senior analyst with the non-government organisation Global Initiative Against Transnational Organised Crime has co-authored a report shedding light on the group.