Screenshot

Original version

BBC Radio 4 FM

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

BBC Radio 4

Radio 4

Radio 4 (FM)

Documentaries

Podcasts

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media: Arts

Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode guide us through the expanding universe of the moving image

Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode guide us through the expanding universe of the moving image revealing fascinating links and hidden gems from cinema and TV to streaming and beyond.

BBC Radio 4 LW

Screenshot: Box Office Bombs

Box Office Bombs

BBC Radio 4 - Screenshot, Box Office Bombs

Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode explore big-budget flops, from Ishtar to Cats.

Ellen E Jones and Mark Kermode explore big budget flops, from Ishtar to Cats.

Ishtar – writer and director Elaine May's huge budget comedy starring Warren Beatty and Dustin Hoffman – was released in May 1987. The film, about a pair of incompetent singer-songwriters who become entangled in a CIA plot in north Africa, tanked at the box office and ultimately put paid to May's directing career. In the process the word Ishtar became a joke - that title alone symbolising Hollywood hubris at its worst. But, as May put it, "If all the people who hate Ishtar had seen it, I would be a rich woman."

Thirty five years on, Mark asks culture critic Lindsay Zoladz and comedian and director Richard Ayoade whether Ishtar is ripe for reappraisal. 

And Ellen draws up a set of rules to help Hollywood studio bosses avoid box office bombs in 2022, running them past Film Stories founder Simon Brew and Hollywood super-producer Lynda Obst. 

Also, controversial director Gaspar Noe shares his Viewing Notes. 

Producer: Jane Long
A Prospect Street production for 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

Screenshot

Box Office Bombs

Genres

Brand

BBC Radio 4 FM

About BBC Radio 4