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Front Row: Talking Heads, Jarvis Cocker, Thomas Clay

Talking Heads, Jarvis Cocker, Thomas Clay

BBC Radio 4 - Front Row, Talking Heads, Jarvis Cocker, Thomas Clay

We review the remake of Alan Bennett's Talking Heads and consider the art of the monologue

We review the remake of Alan Bennett's Talking Heads and consider the art of the monologue. Plus Thomas Clay on his Puritan western staring Maxine Peake and Charles Dance.

Alan Bennett's Talking Heads have been remade for television decades after the original series. Alongside two brand new monologues, ten episodes have been re-created with actors including Jodie Comer, Sarah Lancashire and Lucian Msamati. Theatre critic Sam Marlowe reviews these socially distanced dramas, and actor Lisa Dwan joins her to discuss the art of the monologue.

The pandemic has changed all of our lives, but could there be a way to change society for the better as we re-build after coronavirus.  As part of BBC Radio's Re-think season, musician and broadcaster Jarvis Cocker makes the case for creating space for nature.

Thomas Clay discusses his new film Fanny Lye Deliver’d, which he wrote, directed and composed the music for, and which he describes as a ‘Puritan western’. Maxine Peak and Charles Dance star as a married couple on a remote Shropshire farm in the wake of the English Civil War, whose lives change forever following the unexpected arrival of a young couple in need.

Main image above: Tamsin Greig in BBC One's Talking Heads
Image credit: BBC/London Theatre Company Productions/Zac Nicholson

Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe 
Producer: Hannah Robins

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