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BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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Kirsty Lang

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Hannah Robins

Front Row: Timothy Spall, Tracy Chapman's Fast Car turns 30, Novelist Lissa Evans

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11/06/2018

Timothy Spall, Tracy Chapman's Fast Car turns 30, Novelist Lissa Evans

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Timothy Spall, Tracy Chapman's Fast Car turns 30, Novelist Lissa Evans

Timothy Spall on playing every part in his new film Stanley, a Man of Variety.

Timothy Spall on playing every part in his new film Stanley, a Man of Variety, plus Front Row celebrates 30 years since Tracy Chapman's Fast Car.

Timothy Spall discusses his new film Stanley, A Man of Variety, in which he plays every character on screen. It follows Stanley, the only inmate in a failing insane asylum, as he wrestles with the voices in his head which take the form of classic comedy stars such as George Formby and Noël Coward.

30 years ago today, a concert to celebrate the 70th birthday of Nelson Mandela was staged at London's Wembley Stadium and broadcast to an audience of 600 million around the world. It was at this event that Tracy Chapman, a 24-year-old singer-songwriter from Cleveland, Ohio, first came to worldwide attention as she stepped in last minute and played a selection of songs from her new album. The album, with its hit singles including Fast Car and Baby Can I Hold You Tonight, went on to sell over 20 million copies worldwide and propelled Tracy Chapman to global fame. Music critic Jacqueline Springer reminisces about that watershed moment in musical history.

Writer Lissa Evans talks about her latest novel, Old Baggage, which follows a firebrand suffragette yearning for her militant past. Lissa discusses her popular children's book Wed Wabbit and seeing her novel Their Finest Hour and a Half made into a successful film starring Gemma Arterton and Bill Nighy.

An extraordinary photograph of the G7 summit showing the German Chancellor surrounded by other world leaders confronting a petulant, defiant looking Donald Trump has been shared widely online and been likened to a Caravaggio painting. Art critic, Richard Cork, gives his reaction. 

Presenter: Kirsty Lang
Producer: Hannah Robins.

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