Front Row - 07/07/2009

Arts news and reviews with Mark Lawson. Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince is the sixth book in the Potter franchise and the film of the book is arriving in cinemas. As she teams up once more with Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, now 19, reflects on ten years of playing Hermione Granger alongside Harry Potter and Ron Weasley. Sky Arts is set to recapture a lost era of live television drama with its Theatre Live! project, where six bestselling writers, including Kate Mosse and Jackie Kay, turn their hands to playwriting. The results will be broadcast live. Artistic director Sandi Toksvig and other key figures discuss the challenges and risks involved in making live TV drama. Robin Wright Penn stars in The Privates Lives of Pippa Lee as a woman whose past is threatening to overwhelm her present. Playwright Charlotte Keatley reviews the film which was written and directed by Rebecca Miller. Mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato explains why she is performing in a wheelchair in the Royal Opera House's production of The Barber of Seville after fracturing her leg onstage.