Front Row

The acclaimed novelist Kazuo Ishiguro talks about how he went about curating a season of films featuring trains for the BFI - from classics such as Shanghai Express by Josef von Sternberg and Sidney Lumet's Murder on the Orient Express to lesser known gems - and about how trains have inspired his own work - including songs, and his forthcoming novel, Miss Lambert Steps Aboard Danger.
Actresses Maureen Beattie and Tracy-Ann Oberman discuss why they've changed the gender of popular roles for stage productions which are opening soon - Lear at Pitlochry Festival Theatre which sees one of Shakespeare's greatest tragic figures portrayed as a matriarch in decline, and at the Theatre Royal Bath, Garry Essendine in Noel Coward's comedy about the perils of celebrity Present Laughter is now Gerri Essendine, an ageing actress desperately clinging on to her youthful beauty.
Author Stuart Cosgrove hails Village People frontman Victor Willis (whose death has just been announced) as one of the finest soul voices of his generation, whose talents were perhaps overlooked due to the novelty reputation which came to be associated with the group.
And Dr Sonke Prigge tells us why - and how - he has preserved the sound of the clattering mill, traditionally used in Germany to scare away birds from cherry orchards, for the British Library's sound archive.
Presenter: Kirsty Wark
Producer: Mark Crossan

Author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and The Circle, Dave Eggers is back with a new novel about a young aspiring artist. Contrapposto follows Cricket, an insular smalltown boy, enchanted by drawing, as well as an older girl, and in part draws on Eggers’ on experiences of the art world. Visiting the UK for the first time in over a decade, he speaks to Samira Ahmed in a rare interview.
As an officially licensed AI Michael Caine narrated audiobook The Odyssey has recently been released, Media and AI lawyer Kelsey Farish and Guardian Film Editor Catherine Shoard discuss why a number of high profile actors, or their estates, have signed up to have their images and voices cloned for use by AI and what it means for the future of the industry.
Jamir Nazir has won this year's Commonwealth Short Story Prize. Called The Serpent in the Grove, he explains how his childhood observations of rural life in his native Trinidad inspired the story, and describes the impact of winning on him and his family.
Craig Gillespie talks about his new film Supergirl, a space adventure starring The House of Dragon actress Milly Alcock as Superman's mighty cousin. The I, Tonya and Cruella director reveals how this movies was inspired by the western True Grit and why he wanted to make the last daughter of Krypton a more complex and flawed character than has been shown on screen before.
Presenter: Samira Ahmed
Producer: Andrea Kidd

We mark the passing of actress Dame Penelope Keith, speaking with John Lloyd and Mel Giedroyc about her long career.
Actor Russell Tovey plays a troubled police officer dealing with a late night emergency in The Guilty at The Donmar Warehouse in London.
Katherine Rundell on updating Cinderella for a contemporary audience, as part of Radio 4's Once Upon a Time series.
We discover the photographic genius of Jacques Henri Lartigue, whose work spanned almost the entire 20th century. An exhibition of his colour photographs has just opened in Milton Keynes
Presenter: Samira Ahmed

Writer Charlotte Mullins and author Viv Groskop join Tom to discuss the Frida Kahlo exhibition at Tate Modern in London. It's the highest pre-selling exhibition in Tate's history, and contains 30 significant works, has her clothes on display, and looks at the artist's life and impact on contemporaries and later generations.
They also offer their verdict on the Danish black comedy The Last Viking, which is the 6th film by director/actor trio Anders Thomas Jensen, Nikolaj Lie Kaas and Mads Mikkelsen.
Finally, they talk about Lisa Owens' novel Natural Disaster which dissects the last 24 hours before a mother goes back to work after maternity leave.
Plus The Box in Plymouth is revealed as the winner of the UK Museum of the Year, with Chair of Judges Jenny Waldman.
Presenter: Tom Sutcliffe
Producer: Claire Bartleet

25 years since she published her first Charlie and Lola book, former Children's Laureate Lauren Child returns with a new friendship-focused series featuring best-friends Lotta and Lola. She joins us to talk about her approach to writing for children and about the importance of reading together as a family.
Refik Anadol, one of the creative team behind Dataland, a vast new museum dedicated to AI art which opened this weekend in Los Angeles, tells us about the multi-sensory experiences visitors walk through on their journey through the building and how the Museum embraces and celebrates digital art while finding solutions to energy usage and volumes of data.
Turner Prize winning artist Jasleen Kaur's new trail of sculptures on the banks of the River Clyde in Glasgow take the form of weather vanes and question the city's links to trade and colonialism. She tells us more about this commission to mark Glasgow 2026, the cultural festival which complements this summer's Commonwealth Games.
And as an exhibition of theatrical portraits of stars of stage and screen by Cecil Beaton go on display at Harewood House in Yorkshire, curator Bryony Smith and design historian Stephen Bayley explain why everyone who was anyone wanted to sit for the legendary photographer, and how his photographs also changed public perceptions of the monarchy.
Presenter: Kirsty Wark
Producer: Mark Crossan