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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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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Live magazine programme on the worlds of arts, literature, film, media and music.

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Front Row: Melina Matsoukas on Queen and Slim, Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy years reviewed, Faustus: That Damned Woman, Richard Armitage

Melina Matsoukas on Queen and Slim, Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy years reviewed, Faustus: That Damned Woman, Richard Armitage

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Melina Matsoukas on Queen and Slim, Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy years reviewed, Faustus: That Damned Woman, Richard Armitage

Melina Matsoukas on her film about police violence starring Daniel Kaluuya.

Melina Matsoukas on her film about police violence starring Daniel Kaluuya and what if Faustus was a woman - we talk to Chris Bush about her new take on this classic story.

Director Melina Matsoukas talks about her first feature film Queen and Slim, which follows a black couple on a lackluster date pulled over for a minor traffic infraction. The situation escalates, with sudden and tragic results and the erstwhile couple decide to go on the run. Known primarily as a director of music videos for megastars like Beyoncé, Matsoukas discusses her transition between mediums and the film’s political message.   

Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy Years is the first exhibition to survey the artist’s earliest works - pots, plates and sculptures - which he made between 1982 and 1994. Critic Jacky Klein reviews the exhibition at the Holburne Museum in Bath which includes pottery that addresses his regular themes of gender, identity and social class.

The life of Faust, an itinerant alchemist and astrologer in 15th century Germany, has inspired great writers through the centuries, most notably Christopher Marlowe. Now Chris Bush reinvents the story again; Faustus is a woman and, instead of using the powers of Mephistopheles for self-gratificiation she seeks the kinds of knowledge denied women through the ages, traveling through time to attain it. Stig talks to Chris Bush about her ambitious, ideas-laden new play, Faustus: That Damned Woman.    

As we continue to explore risk in the arts, actor Richard Armitage speaks to us about the physical and reputational risk of being waterboarded for the filming of Spooks. 

Presenter: Stig Abell
Producer: Hannah Robins

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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Melina Matsoukas on Queen and Slim, Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy years reviewed, Faustus: That Damned Woman, Richard Armitage

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