The Drawing Room

What makes for a good ending? Of a work of art; of a career; of a life? And does the ending matter, if what's happened before it has been a grand success?

Geoff Dyer has written about photography, jazz, travel, cinema, service and anything else that captures his attention, and taken home a bushel of prizes along the way.

And in his latest work, The Last Days of Roger Federer, he's turned his eye to endings.

Aurora Mardiganian became a surprising sensation in America in the late 1910s. A survivor of the massacre and exile of the Armenian people, her story became a cause celebre and was turned into a movie: Auction of Souls.

Following the first World War, President Wilson sought an American mandate for Armenia, but his plan was defeated in Congress and, shortly afterwards, copies of the film vanished.

A new documentary, Aurora's Sunrise, uses recovered scenes from the film, archival testimony, and animation, to tell Aurora's story.

Inna Sahakyan is the film's director and co-writer and in the Drawing Room she explores the story around the film, which won Best Animated Film at the Asian Pacific Screen Awards, and was the Armenian entry for the Oscars this year.

Tina Turner is a true superstar, with decades of hits, so what's it like to take to the stage and become the legend?

Ruva Ngwenya has be playing the role of Tina Turner in the Australian production of the musical, Tina, and in the Drawing Room she talks high school musicals, training regimes, and channeling the spirit of Tina Turner

Simone Young is a world-renowned conductor who has led symphony orchestras and opera companies across the globe and shattered more than a few glass ceilings along the way.

She's returned home as the chief conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and is the centre of a new documentary, Knowing The Score.

In the Drawing Room, Simone discusses music, Tár, and what real life is actually like for one of the world's elite conductors.

When Michael Fabiano's music teacher, the legendary tenor George Shirley, told him he had a moral duty to share his voice, everything changed. Michael abandoned his plans for business or law and went home to map out in extraordinary detail what it would take to become one of the world's premiere opera singers.

Now he's performing on the world's biggest stages, with a foundation that brings music education to a new generation.

Named as the Americana Music Emerging Act of the Year in 2021 — about the same time as his 8th release — Charley Crockett has built a career on his own terms.

With a sound that recalls the greats of blues, folk and country music, and a personal story better than any song could contain, it's no surprise that he's getting people's attention.

Being one of the best in the world at what you do is an almost impossible goal. And maintaining that position is the work of a lifetime.

Australian born Connor O'Leary is one of the top surfers in the world, but he's had to prove his skill many times, fighting for qualification to the sport's Championship Tour

His journey is one of the stories at the centre of a new documentary series, Chasing Waves, which explores the Japanese connection to surfing, in the wake of the 2021 Olympics.

Beginning life as a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, then an Oscar-winning film, The Hours tells the story of three women, separated by time, but connected by Virginia Woolf's book Mrs Dalloway.

Now, the story has its own third life: as an opera.

Presented by New York's Metropolitan Opera, the production was composed by another Pulitzer Prize winner, Kevin Puts, and is now heading to screens as part of their HD Live series.

She's photographed the rich and famous, worked with Nick Cave over the decades and even taken Queen Elizabeth's portrait.

But after stepping away from commercial portraiture, Polly Borland has produced her most interesting work, exploring the human body in abstract and sometimes unsettling ways that have seen her exhibited around the world.

In her latest collection, Nudie and Blobs, Borland has turned the lens on herself, with abstract selfies of her own body taken with a mobile phone and a selfie stick.

Across Australia, down suburban alleyways or in the heart of the cities, are dozens of small theatres.

They work without the budgets or the recognition of the big state companies, but that means they can take risks and give a home to unusual and emerging Australian voices.

For five decades, Liz Jones has been working with the legendary La Mama Theatre in Melbourne, and for most of that time she's been the artistic director. Now, she's finally calling time on the role, leaving a thriving theatre and a remarkable legacy.