Saturday Review

By BBC Radio 4Society & Culture

Saturday Review episodes

November 02, 2019 Making Waves, The Antipodes, Hanne Orstavik, His Dark Materials, Joy Labinjo
Making Waves: The Art Of Cinematic Sound is a documentary looking at (and listening to) the work of sound designers in film. What do they do and how do they affect the viewer?
The Antipodes the latest play by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Annie Baker. Set in a brainstorming meeting for some undisclosed creative company, the tensions of office relationships and the need to be imaginative lead to tensions
Hanne Orstavik's novel Love unfolds in a village in far northern Norway. Jon is a young boy, looking forward to his birthday tomorrow, always thinking of his mother even though the attention isn't reciprocal
The BBC has a brand new version of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. It's been a book, a BBC Radio play, a film and now a TV adaptation. How does the small screen incarnation fare?
Joy Labinjo is a young Nigerian/British painter who has an exhibition of her work at The Baltic in Gateshead.
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Ellah Wakatama Allfrey, Christopher Frayling and Kathryn Hughes. The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast Extra recommendations:
Ellah: Media Democracy podcast
Christopher: The Dublin Murders and Paolozzi exhibition at Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert in London
Kathryn: The Reinvention of Humanity by Charles King
Tom: Guilt on BBC2 and The CryptoQueen podcast

Main image: Dafne Keen
Photo credit: Bad Wolf/BBC One/HBO
52 min
October 26, 2019 Play Well, Monos, Vassa, Elizabeth Strout, The Accident
Play Well is a new exhibition opening at the Wellcome Collection in London, aiming to explore how play transforms both childhood and society.
On a mountaintop in Colombia, eight children with guns watch over a hostage and a conscripted milk cow, communicated with over the radio by a threatening commander. That's the basic plot of a new film Monos, which has won awards at international festivals.
Vassa is the new production at London's Almeida Theatre, adapted from Maxim Gorky's play by Mike Bartlett and starring Siobhan Redmond.
Elizabeth Strout's new novel Olive Again reintroduces readers to Olive Kitteridge, from her best-selling 2008 novel. Older and (maybe) wiser, she's as blunt and delightful as ever as she copes with a second marriage.
The Accident is a new series beginning on Channel 4 written by Jack Thorne and starring Sarah Lancashire.
Presented by Emma Woolf, the reviewers are Pat Kane, Alex Clark and Sally Gardner. The producer is Oliver Jones.
Podcast Extra recommendations:
Sally: Mystify
Pat: The Emotional Mind by Stephen T Asma and Rami Gabriel
Alex: The Reluctant Landlord on TV and the Kilkenny One Act Play festival
Emma: George Gissing
47 min
October 19, 2019 Non Fiction, Stillicide and The Diver's Game, There Are No Beginnings, Pre-Raphaelite Sisters, Living With Yourself
Non Fiction is a very French film about writers and publishers debating the future of the book vs e-book. But the characters also all appear to be having affairs with each other: Tres Francais! But will our reviewers be seduced?
Stillicide by Cynan Jones and The Diver's Game by Jesse Ball are two new dystopian novels which both authors insist are NOT dystopian. Who's right; The reader or the author?
There Are No Beginnings is the play chosen to open the newly renovated Leeds Playhouse. The playwright Charley Miles has insisted it is "NOT a play about The Yorkshire Ripper" but his presence is a dark force at the centre of the play.
Pre-Raphaelite Sisters is a new exhibition at London's National Portrait Gallery which aims to look at the women behind the movement most commonly associated with the Brotherhood - as models, artists, makers, partners and poets.
Living With Yourself is a Netflix series starring Paul Rudd as a man who accidentally finds himself cloned and having to deal with the new version of himself
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Helen Lewis, Maev Kennedy and Laurence Scott. The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast Extra selections
Helen: Mephisto at The Gate Theatre... and public loos at theatres more generally
Maev: Georgette Heyer
Laurence: Patricia Lockwood on John Updike in the LRB
55 min
October 12, 2019 The Day Shall Come, Man In The White Suit, Zadie Smith, Hogarth - Place and Progress
Chris Morris's film The Day Shall Come, is a very dark comedy about a genuine FBI operation to deal with potential domestic terrorists in the USA.
Man In The White Suit was one of the highly-successful Ealing Comedy films. Released in 1951, it told the story of a man who invents a revolutionary fabric. Now adapted for the stage starring Stephen Mangan in the role originally played by Alec Guinness.
Zadie Smith has published a collection of short stories called Grand Union.
Hogarth exhibition - Place and Progress. All of the paintings and engravings in Hogarth's series are united for the first time at the Sir John Soanes Museum in London
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Bob and Roberta Smith, Naima Khan and Stephanie Merritt. The producer is Oliver Jones.
Podcast Extra recommendations:
Bob and Roberta Smith - Kara Walker at Tate Modern
Stephanie: Rachel Cusk - Coventry, Zadie Smith - In Defence Of Fiction, Rebecca Solnit - Whose story is this , Sinead Gleeson -Constellation, Emilie Pine - Notes to Self. Also Brooklyn 99
Naima: The Guilty on Netflix
Tom: The Politician on Netflix and Jonathan Coe - Sinking Giggling Into The Sea in the LRB
Main image: Marchánt Davis, The Day Shall Come
Courtesy eOne / IFC Films
50 min
October 05, 2019 Joker, Mary Costello, A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, Dublin Murders, Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art
Joker: What was it about the new DC comic-based film which helped it to win the highest prize at this year's Venice Film Festival? Starring Joaquin Phoenix, it's a dark affair but is it deserving of the plaudits and prizes?
Mary Costello's new novel "The River Capture" is set in rural Ireland where a young woman arrives and changes the life of those she meets
A revival of A Day In The Death Of Joe Egg at London's Trafalgar Studios comes shortly after the death of its author Peter Nichols.
Dublin Murders is an adaptation by Sarah Phelps of the Tana French novels for BBC TV
A new exhibition at London's Barbican Centre - Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art - spans the 1880s to the 1960s, celebrating the creativity of the spaces in which artists, performers, designers, musicians and writers congregated to push the boundaries of artistic expression.
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Alex Preston, Katy Puckrik and Amanda Vickery. The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast Extras:
Katie: Twenty Thousand Hertz podcast
Alex: The poetry of Mary Oliver
Amanda: Unbelievable on Netflix
Tom: Kara Walker at Tate Modern
Main image: A Day in the Death of Joe Egg
L-R Lucy Eaton, Claire Skinner, Storme Toolis, Patricia Hodge, Toby Stephens, Clarence Smith
Photographer: Marc Brenner
56 min
September 28, 2019 Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp, The Last Tree, The Dutch House, Mark Leckey, World on Fire
Caryl Churchill celebrated her 80th birthday last year. She's written four new short plays for the Royal Court, the theatre with which she's most closely associated: Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp. Horror and abuse flash through often very funny scenes played by a cast including Toby Jones and Deborah Findley.
Shola Amoo's praised second feature The Last Tree is an account of a boy of Nigerian heritage who grows up in foster care in rural Lincolnshire and then goes to live with his mother in South London. It draws on some of his personal experience.
Ann Patchett's new novel The Dutch House is a study of what money can do to a family, what motherhood means and the nature of loss - and it includes a character she claims is her first real villain.
Mark Leckey's exhibition O'Magic Power of Bleakness at Tate Britain re-creates a space under a motorway bridge on the M53 where he used to hang out as a child for an audio-visual journey into memory and the world of spirits.
And World on Fire is a new BBC1 drama for Sunday nights telling the story of the Second World War from both international and personal perspectives, by award-winning writer Peter Bowker.
This week's reviewers are cultural commentator Gaylene Gould, author Catherine O'Flynn and Toby Lichtig, fiction editor of the TLS.
Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe
Producer: Sarah Johnson
This week's podcast extra choices are:
Gaylene: Cleveland Watkiss at the EFG London Jazz Festival https://efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk/events/cleveland-watkiss-60th
Catherine: Pushing Paper at the British Museum https://www.britishmuseum.org/whats_on/exhibitions/pushing_paper.aspx
and Hikaru Davis' videos finding out about his dad, David Bowie drummer Dennis Davis: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCY2aDqSy2_g6hysuYU7uOPw/featured
Toby: Brett Anderson of Suede's new memoir Afternoons with the Blinds Drawn
Tom: Daniel Rachel's book Don't Look Back in Anger
Main Image: Glass. Kill. Bluebeard. Imp.
L-R Toby Jones, Deborah Findlay, Sule Rimi
Photo credit: Johan Persson
49 min
September 21, 2019 The Farewell, Quichotte, Antony Gormley, Reasons to Stay Alive, Nomad: In The Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin
Lulu Wang's personal film The Farewell stars rapper Awkwafina in its lead role as a granddaughter not sure whether she should collude with a lie about her grandmother's health. Shot mostly in Mandarin Chinese, it's been a huge success at the US box office.
Quichotte is Salman Rushdie's latest, Booker-shortlisted novel, a satire on contemporary life and politics. Does its Don Quixote-style plot take the reader with it on its wild ride?
Antony Gormley's solo exhibition at the Royal Academy has involved flooding a room in the gallery and filling another with his trademark cast iron figures hanging in different directions from the ceiling, walls and floors.
Reasons to Stay Alive at the Sheffield Crucible Studio is based on Matt Haig's enormously successful book of the same name and explores the nature and impact of depression on those who have it and those around them, using choreography and creative staging.
Nomad: In The Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin is a new film by Werner Herzog. His friend, the traveller and writer Bruce Chatwin, died in 1989 but left him his backpack. Taking it with him he travels the world and considers his relationship with Chatwin.
This week's reviewers are Meg Rosoff, Bidisha and Patrick Gale. Presented by Tom Sutcliffe.
Podcast extra recommendations:
Meg suggests wandering elsewhere at the Royal Academy to see the Félix Vallotton and Helene Schjerfbeck exhibitions: https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions-and-events and Wilding by Isabella Tree
Bidisha: Awkwafina on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqDpVfc2_sYFrdGZ8yhRk4Q
Patrick: Better Than Us on Netflix
Tom: Undone on Amazon Prime
47 min
September 14, 2019 Hustlers, A Very Expensive Poison, Tove Ditlevsen, William Blake, State of the Union
Hustlers is a new crime drama film based on a 2015 article in New York magazine about a group of strippers in the USA who decided to embezzle money from the men who came to their club.
A Very Expensive Poison at The Old Vic in London tells the story of the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB man who was poisoned in 2006 in London by agents of the Russian state.
A trio of autobiographical works by the late Danish novelist Tove Ditlevsen have just been published: Childhood, Youth and Dependency.
There's an extensive exhibition of art by William Blake just opened at Tate Britain
State Of The Union is a BBC TV series written by Nicjk Hornby and starring Chris O'Dowd and Rosamund Pike as a married couple undergoing marital therapy
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Liz Jensen, Amber Butchart and John Mullan. The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast extra recommendations:
Liz: Guerrilla gardening
John: Gloucester Crescent by William Miller
Amber: Margate Caves and Leiden Textile Research Centre in Holland https://www.trc-leiden.nl/
Tom: The Lives of Lucian Freud by William Feaver + Evan Davis' Sharpiegate on Thursday's PM on Radio 4 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0008bb7 (listen from 41.22)
51 min
September 07, 2019 Rojo, Hansard, James Meek, Rothschilds at Waddesdon Manor, Defending the Guilty
Argentinian film Rojo is set just before the 1975 military coup, looking at the simmering tensions and the complicity that made it happen and the way so many people turned a blind eye
Hansard at London's National Theatre is a debut play. A junior Tory minister under Margaret Thatcher comes into deeply personal conflict with his politically-opposed wife over Clause 28
James Meek's novel 'To Calais In Ordinary Time' tells a story about 14th century Europe, written in a distinctive argot scattered with arcane language, following the lives of several characters dealing with - among other things - the approaching Black Death.
A new display of items owned by The Rothschilds has opened at Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire. Items of immense value from ruby and emerald jewellery to Roman glassware and amber caskets, many of these items haven't been on public display before
Defending The Guilty is a comedy series on BBC2 exploring the world of barristers
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Mark Billingham, Barb Jungr and Julia Raeside.
The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast Extra recommendations
Julia: The Dublin Murders by Sarah Phelps + The Portland Brothers + Box Of Delights podcast
Barb: Edna O'Brien -The Little Red Chairs + Jazzmeia Horn + Bob, Brel and Me
Mark: Peaky Blinders + Nick Lowe
Tom: Robert Harris - The Second Sleep + Mortimer and Whitehouse go Fishing
51 min
August 31, 2019 The Souvenir, Bait, Appropriate, Mary Beth Keane, A Confession
Two Brit indie film productions arrive at once: Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir is a slightly autobiographical work about a struggling young film-maker's relationship with a charismatic drug addict. Also Bait; set in a fishing village in Cornwall and with an intentionally handmade aesthetic, it explores the tense relationship between locals and incomers.
Appropriate at The Donmar Warehouse is a new play from Brandon Jacobs Jenkins. A family in the American south are dealing with the estate of their recently deceased father and unearth some unpleasant truths
Mary Beth Keane's new novel - Ask Again, Yes - is set in modern upstate New York following two families whose lives intertwine
A Confession on ITV is based on a realm life crime story and stars Martin Freeman as a policeman who has to push the law to achieve justice
Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Lisa Appignanesi, Emma Jane Unsworth and Andrew Miller
The producer is Oliver Jones
Podcast Extra recommendations:
Emma Jane: Succession series 2 and The New Me by Halle Butler
Lisa: Benjamin Markovits - Christmas in Austin and Address Unknown by Kressman Taylor and Timberlake Wertenbaker's Proust
Andrew: Chihuly at Kew Gardens and Chernobyl TV series and Eurythmics
Tom: Wainwright bagging in The Lake District
51 min