Free Thinking: Canada 150: Sydney Newman and British TV; Vahni Capildeo; Shubbak Festival 2017

Arts & Ideas

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 599 Ratings

🗓️ 29 June 2017

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Matthew Sweet looks at the Canadian influence on British TV drama in the early 1960s, with director Alvin Rakoff, Sydney Newman biographer, Ryan Danes, and Graeme Burk, contributor to the publication of Newman's memoirs. Newman was instrumental in setting up Armchair Theatre, The Avengers and Doctor Who and The Wednesday Play at a time when broadcasting was in an excitingly fluid state.

The British-Trinidadian poet Vahni Capildeo on her Forward Prize winning collection Measures of Expatriation and a new Poetry Prize for Second Collections, the Ledbury Forte Prize.

Artists Larissa Sanour and Jonathan May discuss the Survival of the Artist as this year's Shubbak, London's festival of Contemporary Arab Culture opens.

Presenter: Matthew Sweet Guests: Graeme Burk 'Head of Drama: The Memoir of Sydney Newman' by Sydney Newman (Author), Ted Kotcheff (Foreword, Contributor), Graeme Burk (Contributor) out in September Ryan Danes 'The Man Who Thought Outside the Box: The Life and Times of Doctor Who Creator Sydney Newman' out now Vahni Capildeo 'Measure of Expatriation' out now.

The Ledbury Poetry Festival 30th June to 9th July 2017

The Survival of the Artist presented by The Mosaic Rooms, at the British Museum July 2nd, part of Shubbak, London's Festival of Contemporary Arab Culture 1–16 July 2017 .

Producer: Jaqueline Smith.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?
0:23.3	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music
0:27.0	when it's out of ice cream.
0:28.8	Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.
0:32.0	Hello, I'm Matthew Sweet and thanks for downloading this Arts and Ideas podcast,
0:36.5	free thinking and on with the show.
0:38.5	This is the BBC.
0:42.0	Hello, it may be possible to legislate against the free movement of people,
0:46.8	but the free movement of culture, the free movement of art, the free movement of ideas,
0:52.2	that's a bit more tricky.
0:53.8	Free thinking is here to observe the traffic.
0:56.8	The poetry of Varney Capildeo gathers its materials from Trinidad and Iceland,
1:02.0	and everywhere between.
1:03.4	She'll join us soon from Glasgow.
1:05.6	The Shubuk Festival brings the best of Arab art to the British capital,
1:10.0	and we'll bring it to your ears.
1:12.1	But we're going to begin with our contribution to Radio 3 celebration of the sesquicentennial of Canada
1:18.5	by telling the story of how five decades ago Canadian talent came over here and shook up British
1:25.2	television drama, and we're keeping one particular talent in focus.
1:29.7	A stocky Torontonian with a Clark Gable Moustache who gave the small screen the benefit of
1:35.6	Ken Loach, Verity Lambert, Pinter and Patrick McNee.
1:39.6	Remove Sidney Newman from television history and you unravel the whole causal nexus.
	...

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