This Cultural Life

This Cultural Life episodes:

• 05.02.2024

  Sebastião Salgado

  Brazilian photographer Sebastião Salgado is best known for his captivating black and white photographs. He has documented scenes of hardship and desperation in times of war and famine; he has explored global labour and migration; and he has captured the...

  
• 04.25.2024

  Antony Gormley

  For over forty years, the sculptor Sir Antony Gormley has been using his own body as the basis for his artistic work, and is known for creating cast iron human figures that stand on high streets, rooftops and beaches, as...

  
• 04.18.2024

  Sam Taylor-Johnson

  As part of the so-called Britart generation of the early 1990’s, artist Sam Taylor-Wood, as she was then known, made her name with photographic and video pieces. Diagnosed with colon cancer in 1997, and then breast cancer three years later,...

  
• 04.11.2024

  Antonio Pappano

  Sir Antonio Pappano is one of the world’s most acclaimed conductors. He started work at the age of ten as an accompanist for his father, who worked as a singing teacher. After leading orchestras in Brussels and Oslo, Pappano was...

  
• 04.05.2024

  Michael Palin

  John Wilson talks to actor, comedian, broadcaster and writer Sir Michael Palin. A founding member of the hugely influential comedy troupe Monty Python’s Flying Circus, he wrote and performed in its five television series and three feature films including The...

  
• 02.10.2024

  Yorgos Lanthimos

  Filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos first emerged as part the so-called ‘weird wave’ of Greek cinema, and is known for unsettling themes and absurdist humour of his films. He made his mark internationally in 2009 with Dogtooth, which won a Cannes film...

  
• 02.03.2024

  Juliette Binoche

  French actor Juliette Binoche is known for her portrayal of emotionally complex characters. Over a forty year career, her films have included Three Colours Blue, Les Amants de Pont Neuf, Chocolat, and The English Patient, for which she won her...

  
• 01.27.2024

  Frank Auerbach

  A rare interview with Frank Auerbach, one of the world’s greatest living painters. At 92 years old, he has been painting for over 70 years and still works every day. A child refugee from Nazi Germany whose parents were killed...

  
• 01.20.2024

  Boy George

  Born George O'Dowd, Boy George shot to pop stardom in 1982 as frontman with the band Culture Club and later as a solo artist. With his soulful vocals and flamboyant, androgynous looks, he became a massive star around the world...

  
• 01.13.2024

  Patricia Cornwell

  Patricia Cornwell’s books have sold over 120 million copies in thirty-six languages in over 120 countries. She’s authored dozens of New York Times bestsellers. For over thirty years her protagonist, the forensic scientist Kay Scarpetta has been investigating murders across...

  
• 01.06.2024

  Andrew Scott

  Andrew Scott won a BAFTA as the evil Moriarty in Sherlock, but is equally loved for a divine television role as the hot priest in Fleabag. A prolific and versatile stage actor, he has starred in many plays by contemporary...

  
• 12.30.2023

  Nigel Kennedy

  John Wilson's guest is the violinist Nigel Kennedy. A prodigy whose childhood talents were nurtured by Yehudi Menuhin, one of the greatest violinist of the 20th century, Kennedy himself became an international star in 1989 with his recording of Vivaldi’s...

  
• 11.04.2023

  Judi Dench

  Dame Judi Dench reflects on her career playing Shakespearean roles on stage and screen across seven decades. Judi Dench has spent her career bringing to life a hugely diverse array of characters. But she is, first and foremost, one of...

  
• 10.28.2023

  Werner Herzog

  Werner Herzog is one of the most idiosyncratic, original and prolific filmmakers of modern times, having made nearly 80 films over six decades. His features include Fitzcarraldo, Aguirre Wrath of God and Rescue Dawn, and his documentaries include the multi...

  
• 10.21.2023

  Bernie Taupin

  Lyricist Bernie Taupin is one half of one of the most successful songwriting partnerships of all time. For more than 50 years, he has written the lyrics for Elton John’s songs including Tiny Dancer, Candle In The Wind, Rocket Man,...

  
• 10.14.2023

  George the Poet

  Born George Mpanga, George the Poet is a British spoken-word artist and podcast host. Having started out as a rapper, he made his name as a spoken-word performance poet after leaving Cambridge University. His debut collection Search Party was published...

  
• 10.07.2023

  Matthew Bourne

  One of the world’s most successful living choreographers, Sir Matthew Bourne shook up classical ballet in the mid 1990s with his ground-breaking company Adventures In Motion Pictures, later renamed New Adventures. His breakthrough production, a radical new version The Nutcracker,...

  
• 09.30.2023

  Lucy Prebble

  Renowned for tackling big themes on stage, Lucy Prebble made her name as a playwright in her mid-twenties when she wrote the hugely successful Enron. The play, which premiered in 2009 and explored the collapse of the American energy corporation...

  
• 09.23.2023

  Michael Rosen

  Author, poet and performer Michael Rosen is one of Britain’s best loved and most prolific children’s writers, having published hundreds of books over nearly fifty years, including his much-loved We’re Going On Bear Hunt, the story of an exciting family...

  
• 09.16.2023

  Angélique Kidjo

  Angélique Kidjo, often described as "the queen of African music", has recorded fifteen albums, worked with a diverse array of musical collaborators from Burna Boy and Alcia Keys to Philip Glass and Peter Gabriel, and won five Grammy Awards. In...

  
• 09.09.2023

  Edmund de Waal

  One of the world’s most acclaimed ceramicists, Edmund de Waal is renowned for simple, hand-made porcelain pots and bowls which are usually displayed in meticulously arranged groups. His work has been shown in museums and galleries including the V&A;, the...

  
• 09.02.2023

  Leïla Slimani

  French Moroccan author Leïla Slimani won critical acclaim and a reputation as an author of bold & brutal fiction with her first two novels. Adele is about a bourgeoise Parisian wife and mother who lives a sexually promiscuous secret life....

  
• 08.19.2023

  Sally Potter

  Sally Potter is a ground-breaking film-maker, best known for her bold 1992 adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s novel Orlando. Starring Tilda Swinton, it was nominated for two Academy Awards and won more than 25 international film prizes. With her 1983 debut...

  
• 08.12.2023

  Stephen Fry

  Actor, writer, comedian and broadcaster Stephen Fry first made his name as a comic performer as a Cambridge University undergraduate with the Footlights company. He went on to forge a television partnership with his university friend Hugh Laurie on the...

  
• 06.17.2023

  Ian McEwan

  Ian McEwan made his name in the 1970s with short stories and slim novels that explored the darker aspects of human nature. He won the Booker Prize in 1998 with his novel Amsterdam, and its follow up Atonement, was adapted...

  
• 06.10.2023

  Jeremy Deller

  Winner of the Turner Prize in 2004 and Britain’s official representative at the 2013 Venice Biennale, Jeremy Deller is an unconventional artist whose work is as likely to be seen in streets or fields as in museums and galleries. In...

  
• 06.03.2023

  Errollyn Wallen

  Errollyn Wallen is one of Britain's most acclaimed and widely performed contemporary composers. Born in Belize and brought up in north London, she was first ever woman to win a Ivor Novello Award for a body of work, and the...

  
• 05.27.2023

  Nicole Farhi

  John Wilson talks to fashion designer and sculptor Nicole Farhi. Born in the south of France, she designed for various labels before teaming up with Stephen Marks in the early 1970s to establish French Connection as a worldwide clothing brand....

  
• 05.20.2023

  Nick Cave

  Nick Cave, the Australian born singer-songwriter and author, reveals the formative influences and experiences that have inspired his own creativity. With his band The Bad Seeds, Cave is renowned for the darkness and drama of his narrative based work. His...

  
• 05.13.2023

  Gilbert & George

  An inseparable duo for over 55 years, Gilbert Prousch and George Passmore are the artistic couple known as Gilbert & George. Always formally dressed in matching suits, Gilbert & George have described themselves as ‘living sculptures’, and are usually the...

  
• 05.06.2023

  Baaba Maal

  Now one of West Africa’s most internationally acclaimed musicians, Baaba Maal trained at a Paris conservatoire and went on to become a kind of musical ambassador, taking stories of his homeland all around the world. He has collaborated with Brian...

  
• 04.29.2023

  Donna Leon

  The internationally bestselling crime writer Donna Leon talks to John Wilson about her career. Although American born, Donna is most associated with Venice, the city in which her Italian police detective protagonist, the mild-mannered family man Guido Brunetti, lives and...

  
• 04.22.2023

  Sally Wainwright

  Award-winning television dramatist and director Sally Wainwright talks to John Wilson about her formative cultural influences. After learning the art of screenwriting whilst working on Coronation Street, she made her name with her suburban comedy drama At Home With The...

  
• 04.15.2023

  Linton Kwesi Johnson

  Reggae poet Linton Kwesi Johnson reveals the influences and experiences that inspired his own creativity. Born in Jamaica, he moved to south London in 1963 at the age of eleven. He made his name as a performance poet, reciting politically...

  
• 04.08.2023

  Martin Parr

  John Wilson talks to photographer Martin Parr about the formative influences and experiences that inspired his own creativity. Globally renowned for his witty and satirical scenes of British life, Parr made his name in the 1970s with a series of...

  
• 04.01.2023

  Margaret Atwood

  Margaret Atwood talks to John Wilson about the formative influences and experiences that shaped her writing. One of the world’s bestselling and critically acclaimed authors, Atwood has published over 60 books including novels, short stories, children’s fiction, non-fiction and poetry....

  
• 02.11.2023

  Alejandro Iñárritu

  Mexican-born filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu talks to John Wilson about his cultural influences. Iñárritu's movies are often epic in scale and ambition. He made his name with the Mexican gangland drama Amores Perros, and won critical acclaim with his...

  
• 02.04.2023

  Rachel Whiteread

  John Wilson speaks to internationally acclaimed artist Dame Rachel Whiteread about the influences on her practice as she recalls some of her most famous works. Part of the Brit Art boom of the early 1990s, Rachel was not only...

  
• 01.28.2023

  Eliza Carthy

  Musician Eliza Carthy was born into an English folk dynasty. The daughter of acclaimed folk singers Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson, she joined the family business at a young age as a singer and violinist, playing with her parents as...

  
• 01.21.2023

  Damien Chazelle

  Oscar-winning film-maker Damien Chazelle talks to John Wilson about his career and cultural influences. As a child, Chazelle first started experimenting with making films using his dad’s old camcorder. After studying filmmaking at Harvard, he drew on his own experiences...

  
• 01.14.2023

  Stephen Hough

  The British born musician, composer and writer Stephen Hough grew up in Cheshire, won the piano section of the very first BBC Young Musician of the Year competition as a teenager, before moving to New York to study at the...

  
• 01.07.2023

  Whoopi Goldberg

  Whoopi Goldberg is the one of very few people to have won all four of America’s big awards - Emmy, Grammy Oscar and Tony - for her work in film, theatre and television. Brought up by a single mother in...

  
• 12.31.2022

  Sam Mendes

  Theatre and film director Sam Mendes first made his mark when he launched London’s Donmar Warehouse theatre in the early 90s. He has won Olivier and Tony Awards for numerous productions including Cabaret, The Ferryman and most recently, The Lehman...

  
• 11.05.2022

  Tim Minchin

  Comedian, actor and composer Tim Minchin wrote the songs for the musical adaptation of the Roald Dahl story Matilda which, after more than a decade of sell-out West End shows, has now also been adapted for the big screen. His...

  
• 10.29.2022

  Florence Pugh

  Florence Pugh was Oscar and BAFTA nominated for her role as Amy March in the adaptation of Little Women. She has won huge acclaim for films including Midsommer, Lady Macbeth, and the Marvel adventure Black Widow. She also played the...

  
• 10.22.2022

  Shirin Neshat

  Shirin Neshat is the world’s foremost Iranian-born artist. Best known for her black and white portraits of veiled women, often with hands and faces overlain with intricate Farsi calligraphy, she works primarily as a photographer and filmmaker. A winner of...

  
• 10.15.2022

  Ken Loach

  Over six decades, Ken Loach has forged a reputation as Britain’s foremost politically-engaged filmmaker, exploring issues of social justice, freedom and power. He has twice won the prestigious Palme d’Or award at the Cannes Film Festival, in 2006 for The...

  
• 10.08.2022

  Es Devlin

  Es Devlin is the world’s foremost set designer, having conceived stage sets for superstar musicians including Beyoncé, Stormzy, Kanye West, U2 and Adele. She has also created sets for opera houses around the world, and for productions at the National...

  
• 10.01.2022

  Glenda Jackson

  Actor and former MP Glenda Jackson reveals the influences and experiences that inspired her work on stage and screen. One of the greatest actors of her generation, Glenda won Academy Awards for Women in Love and A Touch Of Class,...

  
• 09.24.2022

  James Corden

  Actor, writer and comedian James Corden reveals the most important people, events and cultural works that inspired his own creativity. He’s now probably best known as an Emmy-winning television chat show host, although he recently announced that he would step...