Front Row - 12/11/2008

Presented by Mark Lawson. As she publishes Past-it Notes, a collection of her writing, Maureen Lipman talks to Mark Lawson about grief, poetry and a German sausage. To mark 25 years of ITV's long-running police drama, The Bill has joined forces with primetime German cop show SOKO Leipzig for a special two-part story. The Bill Executive Producer Jonathan Young and SOKO Leipzig's Executive Producer Jörg Winger join Mark to discuss the co-production. Tamsin Greig stars as a politician dealing with family scandal in David Hare's latest play, Gethsemane, which looks at fundraising for political parties and the motivation of today's politicians. Times columnist and assistant Editor Peter Riddell reviews the play. Front Row looked through our archives to look at the question of real people in works of art, with clips from Australian playwright Joanne Murray Smith, political spin doctor turned novelist Alastair Campbell, author John Le Carre and singer Carly Simon.