Front Row

Original version

BBC Radio 4 LW

Magazines & Reviews

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

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

BBC Radio 4 FM

Front Row: Rebel Wilson, Ian Holm remembered, Bob Dylan, The Luminaries

Rebel Wilson, Ian Holm remembered, Bob Dylan, The Luminaries

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Rebel Wilson, Ian Holm remembered, Bob Dylan, The Luminaries

Rebel Wilson on her TV series Last One Laughing, and actor Sir Ian Holm remembered.

Australian actor Rebel Wilson on her TV series Last One Laughing, theatre critic Michael Billington on Sir Ian Holm, reviews of Bob Dylan's new album, and TV drama The Luminaries.

Rebel Wilson discusses her new TV series Last One Laughing, where ten comedians are locked in room and if they laugh they get kicked out. The last one standing wins a big cash prize. 

The death was announced today of the actor Sir Ian Holm. Theatre critic Michael Billington pays tribute.

Bob Dylan has just released a new album, Rough and Rowdy Ways.  For our Friday Review, music journalist Laura Barton and commentator Michael Carlson give their verdict on whether this is vintage Dylan. And they discuss The Luminaries, a new BBC drama based on the Booker-winning novel by Eleanor Catton set during New Zealand’s Gold Rush in 1866.  

Unemployed theatre professionals in Minneapolis have been putting their skills to good use, protecting businesses during recent Black Lives Matter protests in the city where George Floyd lived and was killed. As the protests subside, Daisuke Kawachi discusses the University Rebuild project that she's been working on.

Alison Brackenbury has been Front Row’s poet-in-residence this week, reading one of her Museums Unlocked poems every evening. Alison travels about the country to give poetry readings. She makes a point, wherever she goes, of visiting the museum or art gallery. With most now closed, Alison has written new poems about some of the museums she has visited. Her final poem is inspired by a letter she came across in Charles Dickens’ house.

During the lockdown author Rebecca Stott has re-read Daniel Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year, a fictional account of the bubonic epidemic of 1665; Rebecca tells Kirsty Lang  how the book resonates during Covid-19.


Presenter Kirsty Lang
Producer Sarah Johnson
Studio Manager Matilda Macari

BBC Radio 4

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

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Front Row

Rebel Wilson, Ian Holm remembered, Bob Dylan, The Luminaries

Genres

Brand

BBC Radio 4 LW

About BBC Radio 4