Saturday Review

BBC Radio 4
  • 4.5 (68)
  • SOCIETY & CULTURE

Presenter Tom Sutcliffe and guests offer sharp, critical discussion of the week's cultural events

  1. 03/21/2020

    The Nest, The Truth, The Bass Rock, Cranach at Compton Verney and Home Entertainment Recommendations

    The Nest is the new Sunday night drama on BBC One that raises questions around the ethics of surrogacy as a wealthy couple invite a young woman whose past is not known to them into their lives. The Truth is a French/Japanese production directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda who won the Palme d'Or at Cannes in 2018 for his film Shoplifters. It stars Catherine Deneuve and Juliette Binoche in the story of an ageing actress who publishes her memoirs and is confronted by her daughter. Evie Wyld was named as one of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists in 2013. Her new novel, The Bass Rock, tells the story of three generations of women whose fates are linked. Two exhibitions at Compton Verney that have sadly had to close because of coronavirus are kept alive by our critics: Cranach: Artist and Innovator and Fabric: Touch and Identity. And we suggest some culture that might already be on your shelves or on a screen near you to enjoy if you're stuck indoors. Tom Sutcliffe's guests this week are Charlotte Mullins, Bob and Roberta Smith and Laurence Scott. Podcast Extra recommendations Bob: Paul Klee, On Modern Art Certain Blacks, album by The Art Ensemble of Chicago The Letters of Van Gogh Charlotte: The Gallery of Lost Art - as she explains, what's left of it can be found at galleryoflostart.com and via Tate website The West Wing Laurence: Star Trek: the Next Generation, all 7 seasons Tom: Contagion and, as always, Call My Agent Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe Producer: Sarah Johnson Image: Emily (SOPHIE RUNDLE) in The Nest Credit: Mark Mainz / Studio Lambert / BBC

    46 min

  2. 03/14/2020

    Misbehaviour, On Blueberry Hill, Abi Dare, Warhol, Breeders and Kate+Koji

    Misbehaviour is a new film about the 1970 Miss World pageant which saw the first black Miss World and was also disrupted by the nascent Women's Liberation movement who threw flour bombs at host Bob Hope Sebastian Barry's play On Blueberry Hill is set in a prison cell where two men's stories of how they got there become intertwined. Abi Daré's novel The Girl With The Louding Voice is the tale of Adunni, a fourteen year old Nigerian girl who has to go into domestic service in Lagos but is determined to better herself A new retrospective of the work and life of Andy Warhol has just opened at Tate Modern in London, including many works never previoulsy exhibtited in the UK before Two new TV comedies with impeccable pedigrees - ITV's Kate and Koji (written by Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin - who wrote Outnumbered) and Breeders (co-produced by Chris Addison and Simon Blackwell) on Sky TV - have just started. Theyre very different.. are they very funny? Tom Sutcliffe guests are Sara Colllins, Alex Preston and Tiffany Jenkins. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations: Sara: Toni Mossion: The Pieces I Am + Fons Americanus by Kara Walker at Tate Modern Alex: The Confessions of Frannie Langton by Sara Collins Tiffany: Music Clubs - Spin in OXford and House Concerts @42 in Edinburgh Tom: James Shapiro: Shakespeare In a Divided America Main image: Abi Daré © Alero Marcel

    50 min

  3. 03/07/2020

    Hilary Mantel, The Mikvah Project, Sulphur and White, Among The Trees

    Hilary Mantel's new novel - The Mirror and The Light - is the final part of her Thomas Cromwell trilogy. The previous two parts have sold millions of copies worldwide and garned prizes from all quarters. Can this one compare? The Mikvah Project is a new play at The Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond. Two Jewish men meet every Friday for ritual cleansing and a close friendship develops. Sulphur and White is a new British film which tells the true story of a highly successful banker who suffered repeated sexual abuse as a child and how this drove him to seek justice for all abused children A new exhibition at The Hayward Gallery in London - Among The Trees - looks at the crucuial role that trees play in our lives and imaginations Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Christopher Frayling, Abigail Morris and Catherine O'Flynn. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations: Catherine - The National Telephone Kiosk Collection in Bromsgrove and the 1972 film La Cabina Christopher - Who's Afaid of Virginia Woolf at The Tobacco Factory in Bristol and Prints by Norman Ackroyd at Watts Gallery near Guildford Abigail - Carravagio in Rome and Bonus Family on Netflix Tom - English Monsters by James Scudamore Main image: Terraza Alta II, 2018 by Abel Rodríguez Acrylic and ink on paper © the artist and Instituto de Visión 2020

    54 min

  4. 02/29/2020

    Portrait Of A Lady On Fire, Women Beware Women, Christos Tsiolkas, Leon Spilliaert, Noughts and Crosses

    The newest film by French director Céline Sciamma (Tomboy, Girlhood) is Portrait Of A Lady On Fire. An 18th century painter is commissioned to paint a bride-to-be's wedding portrait and falls in love with her subject Women Beware Women is a play by Middleton just opened at The Globe Theatre in London. How do you navigate a society in which women are consciously and unconsciously commodified, coerced and controlled? Australian author Christos Tsiolkas came to international attention with his best-selling novel The Slap. His latest - Damascus - retells the story of St Paul's conversion. Leon Spilliaert was a Belgian painter in the early 20th century whose work often reflected his insomnia and seaside settings. A new exhibition at London's Royal Academy brings this lesser-known artist into the spotlight Malorie Blackman's successful Noughts and Crosses novels have been adapted for TV and they're coming to BBC1 at the beginning of March Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Sathnam Sanghera, Muriel Zhaga and Susan Jeffreys. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations: Sathnam - Jay-Z on Spotify Susan - Choirs and singing by candlelight Muriel - making Delia Smith's marmalade and rewatching Friends Tom - A.N. Wilson's The Mind of the Apostl e Main image © 2020 Curzon Artificial Eye

    49 min

  5. 02/22/2020

    Midnight Family, Masculinities exhibition, Actress by Anne Enright, Far Away by Caryl Churchill, I Am Not Okay With This

    Mexican documentary Midnight Family follows a family-run private ambulance in Mexico City racing to the scenes of accidents in order to earn a living Masculinities:Liberation Through Photography, is a new exhibition at The Barbican in London, about how masculinity is experienced, perfomed, coded and socially constructed. Actress is the latest novel from Irish author by Anne Enright. A daughter looks back at her sometimes fractious relationship with her famous mother A revival of Caryl Churchill's 2000 play Far Away has just opened at London's Donmar Warehouse Teenage existence is never easy and having superpowers can only make it even more so. I Am Not Okay With This on Netflix is a new series with an adolescent female lead... Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Blake Morrison, Amber Butchart and Stephanie Merritt. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations: Stephanie: The Laramie Project Amber: We Will Walk at Turner Contemporary in Margate. And the sauna on Margate Beach Blake: When Time Stopped by Ariana Neumann Tom: Midsommer Main image: Taliban portrait. Kandahar, Afghanistan. 2002 © Collection T.Dworzak/Magnum Photos

    49 min

  6. 02/15/2020

    Stoppard -Leopoldstadt, Emma, Philip Hensher, Steve McQueen - Tate Modern, The End

    Tom Stoppard has a new play - Leopoldstadt - a slightly autobiographical telling of the story of several generations of a wealthy Jewish family in Europe over 6 decades, from 1899 How many different cinematic versions of Jane Austen novels does the world need? What does The latest Emma - directed by a former photographer/ pop video director - bring that's new? A Small Revolution in Germany is the latest novel from Philip hensher. It follows the diverging paths of a group of young politically charged leftists The End is a very darkly comic TV series set in a retirement village on Australia's Gold coast where Edie - played by Harriet Walter - ends up after trying to kill herself A retrospective of the video work of British artist Steve McQueen has just opened at Tate Modern in London. 14 video installations cover his work from 1992 to today Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Ayesha Hazarika, David Benedict and Julia Raeside. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations: Juiia: Julia Jacklin - Crushing David: Tony Kushner's The Visit at The National Theatre and Tana Frech - In The Woods Ayesha: BBC This Life box set and female comedians live Tom: In Wordsworth's Footseps on Radio 4 and American Factory documentary Main image credit: Marc Brenner

    57 min

  7. 02/08/2020

    Mr Jones, Death of England, The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates, British Baroque, This Life

    Director Agnieszka Holland assembles a cast including James Norton and Vanessa Kirby to tell the story of Welsh journalist Gareth Jones who in 1933 travelled to Soviet Russia and told the truth about the famine in Ukraine. At the National Theatre, Clint Dyer directs the play he has co-written with Roy Williams, Death of England, starring Rafe Spall as a white working-class man whose father has died and who has to face up to his conflicted feelings about his country and the people who live in it. Ta-Nehisi Coates has earned a great reputation as a writer and thinker on race in America. His first novel, The Water Dancer, is the story of Hiram Walker who becomes involved in a struggle to leave slavery and save those close to him. British Baroque at Tate Britain takes a look at art from the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 until the death of Queen Anne in 1714, highlighting the jostling for power at court and beyond and illustrating the creation of the great buildings of the age. And This Life returns to BBC4, a drama of young people entering the world of work in the law, perhaps best remembered for the simmering sexual tension between Miles and Anna. Will its fans from 1996 stick with it - and can it draw a new audience? Tom Sutcliffe's guests this week are Jen Harvie, Carl Anka and Terence Blacker. Podcast Extra recommendations Carl: YouTube Channel SB Nation and Brian Phillips' obit of Kobe Bryant available here: https://www.theringer.com/nba/2020/1/30/21114600/kobe-bryant-legacy Jen: film, Parasite on general release; Tate Britain's exhibition Terence: the music of Paolo Conte Tom: Edmund de Waal's book The White Road, and Zadie Smith's essay on Kara Walker in the NY Review of Books Photo: James Norton and Vanessa Kirby, (c) Signature Entertainment

    56 min

  8. 02/01/2020

    Ingmar Bergman, The Lighthouse, William Gibson, The Art, Design and future of Fungi, Art on the BBC

    Ingmar Bergman's 1966 film Persona has been adapted into a stage play and it is the opening production at the newly revamped Riverside Studios in London The Lighthouse, starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson is a black and white film set in a claustrophobic remote isolated lighthouse where the two keepers begin to rub each other up the wrong way William Gibson is a sci-fi writer whose latest novel Agency imagines a dystopian future world where time travel is possible but only virtually The Art, Design and Future of Fungi is an exhibition at Somerset House in London which brings together work by artists and designers, exploring mycophilia, magic mushrooms and fungi futures Art On The BBC is a new documentary series which delves into 60 years of arts coverage on BBC TV, exploring how TV portrayal has changed. Tom Sutcliffe's guests are Meg Rosoff, Katie Puckrik and Colin Grant. The producer is Oliver Jones Podcast Extra recommendations Meg: Jo Jo Rabbit film and Beryl at The Arcola Theatre Katie: Paris In The Spring CD on Ace Records Colin: The Shadow King by Maaza Mengiste Tom: Cheer documentary on Netflix Photo: Beatrix Potter, Hygrophorus puniceus, pencil and watercolour, 7.10.1894, collected at Smailholm Tower, Kelso, courtesy of the Armitt Trust

    57 min
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4.5
out of 5
68 Ratings

About

Presenter Tom Sutcliffe and guests offer sharp, critical discussion of the week's cultural events

Information

  • Creator
    BBC Radio 4
  • Years Active
    2009 - 2020
  • Episodes
    489
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © (C) BBC 2020
  • Show Website
    Saturday Review

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