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Front Row: Martin Shaw; Iraq on film; big band Loose Tubes

Martin Shaw; Iraq on film; big band Loose Tubes

08/10/2010

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Martin Shaw; Iraq on film; big band Loose Tubes

With Kirsty Lang, including an interview with actor Martin Shaw.

With Kirsty Lang, including an interview with actor Martin Shaw and First Lieutenant Mike Scotti, creator of the film This is War.

With Kirsty Lang.

Actor Martin Shaw made his name playing Ray Doyle in crime-action TV drama The Professionals, and more recently has starred as the title characters in Judge John Deed and Inspector George Gently. This year he has returned to the stage to revisit a play he appeared in nearly thirty years ago - The Country Girl, by Clifford Odets. He talks to Kirsty Lang about his performance in the play as washed-up, alcoholic actor Frank Elgin.

In July 2002, First Lieutenant Mike Scotti volunteered to extend his service with the American Marine Corps, and six months later was part of the front-line of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Mike took his own mini DV-camera with him. The resulting footage has now been turned into a documentary, putting the viewer in the boots of a Marine on active service. Mike talks about the experience, and explains how he managed to film whilst being a professional soldier in the line of fire.

Loose Tubes, a young and irreverent big band, found themselves among the stars of the British jazz scene in the 1980s. The 21-piece collective graduated from shows in pubs to playing at the BBC Proms and on Terry Wogan's TV show - in the same week. The band broke up in 1990, and their music has been elusive ever since, but now a recording of one of their final performances has just been released. Band members Django Bates, Iain Ballamy and Ashley Slater look back at life in Loose Tubes. 

Producer Samantha Psyk.

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