Front Row - 20/11/2008

Presented by John Wilson. In 1993, Paul McCartney teamed up with producer and musician Youth to release an experimental ambient music album under the name The Fireman. Fifteen years later and with the identity of the musicians revealed, lyrics have now been added to their third album, Electric Arguments. Paul discusses the freedom of recording as The Fireman and how his experimentalism goes as far back as 1967 and the improvised Beatles track, Carnival of Light, which, he says, the public might soon hear for the first time. In the midst of the credit crunch, it takes some courage to produce a musical in London's West End with no big names and with the Holocaust as its subject. Theatre critic Matt Wolf reviews Imagine This, a musical set in the Warsaw ghetto. Pete Postlethwaite's return to Liverpool's Everyman theatre in the role of King Lear has been one of the most keenly anticipated events in the Capital of Culture calendar. But the play opened to poor reviews and Postlethwaite's debut as Lear seemed destined for ignominy. Pete Postlethwaite talks to John about what went wrong and how the production has changed in the weeks since opening night.