The Drawing Room

Maybe you’ve heard the expression “being a bit too cute”? Someone pushing the boundaries, going a bit far, maybe even being a bit pushy or cunning.

Joshua Paul Dale studies the psychological and biological reactions to cute things like puppies and babies and how the digital world and AI is preying on your very human reaction to these stimuli in his new book Irresistible: How Cuteness Wired our Brains and Conquered the World'

How strongly do you believe in your political convictions? Strong enough to whisk your family away to the other side of the world to pursue your communist ideals?

Boris Frankel was ten when his dad decided to move to the Soviet Union - they were already on an ASIO watch list at the time due to their red-coloured friends in the 1950s. But did the Frankel’s find a perfect communist dream in Russia?

Boris tells the tales of the cast of characters and the challenges they came across in his new book 'No Country for Idealists'

Guest:Boris Frankel, author 

Like in the hit series Breaking Bad, Dale Francis Drake's entrepreneurialism not only went unnoticed by law enforcement but became a blueprint for the methamphetamine business worldwide.

Australia's obsession with the drug is the focus of the new book Meth Road.

Guest:Conor Woodman, Author and journalist

Look around you right now ... wherever you are, you're likely to be surrounded by glass ... windows, reading glasses, device screens, drinking glass or maybe a vase.

Despite making glass for thousands of years, we still don’t fully understand what type of material it is and what happens to it over time.

Guest:Peter Harrowell, Professor of Theoretical Chemistry at the University of Sydney

Foy Vance is known for his gravelly voice and eclectic musical style that blends elements of folk, soul, and blues.

His emotive music is regularly used to tug at heart your heartstrings in television and films and you’ll get to hear why when he plays his hits Guiding Light and She Burns live in the studio. 

Guest: Foy Vance, musician 

If you know even the slightest thing about Iranian cinema, it’s consumed by love and subtlety … love because, well all cinema is about love, but subtlety out of necessity.

Iranian state censors won’t permit anything overt so directors like Behrooz Karamizade need to get creative. He talks about how he got around censorship in his new film Empty Nets.Guest:Behrooz Karamizade, Director

It's a story based on Norse mythology involving dragons and maidens, Gods and gold. The struggle of choosing between power and love … two human but ultimately incompatible pursuits. 

It could only be Wagner's The Ring Cycle.Often described using words like epic the roughly 15-hour performance spread over four operas may seem daunting to some, but Opera singer Daniel Sumegi who’s playing the protagonist Wotan or The Wanderer, King of the Gods says not to overthink it.

You can see him in Opera Australia's performance in Brisbane.

Guest:Daniel Sumegi, Bass-baritone Opera Singer

Alfred Hitchcock more than any other auteur in the 20th century understood the combination of sound when paired with emotion and suspense.

Added to that was his uncanny understanding of branding and marketing for example he once locked the doors of the cinema during the premiere of Psycho. If you don't love Hitchcock, you're about to, as the new documentary My Name is Alfred Hitchcock explores the sometimes malevolent art of Hitchcockian cinema. 

Guest: Dr Wendy Haslem, Associate Professor in Screen Studies at the University of Melbourne

Right now, a secretive war is being waged, pitting hackers against their hunters, in a game in which no one fully knows the true cost, but it's likely in the tens of billions of dollars.

The world's most sought-after ransomware hunter gets more requests than the FBI each day, and it turns out he lives in relative poverty in the town of Normal, Illinois, with 8 cats, two dogs and a bunny rabbit.

Welcome to the world of The Ransomware Hunting TeamGuest:Renee Dudley, author

Rinaldo by Handel tells the story of love, war and redemption, set at the time of the First Crusade.

It was the first Italian language opera written for the London stage and enjoyed great popularity until it was forgotten for two hundred years. 

It is the latest offering from Pinchgut Opera. 

Guests:Alexandra Oomens, SopranoErin Helyard, Artistic Director