Front Row - 24/06/2008

Presented by Mark Lawson. Including: Michael Palin discusses the Danish artist Vilhelm Hammershoi, whose pictures of quiet, haunting interiors form part of a major retrospective at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Novelist and critic Matt Thorne reviews Chris Waitt's film A Complete History of My Sexual Failures, in which he attempts to discover why he has been so unlucky in love by interviewing his ex-girlfriends. With the help of his parents, a hypnotherapist, a torture dungeon and Viagra, Chris films himself on a sexual and emotional quest to solve his personal problems. As singer-songwriter Carly Simon releases her latest album This Kind of Love, she talks to Mark about the loves and relationships that have influenced her long career, her musical children, her lovers, friends, ex-husband James Taylor, and the mysterious subject of You're So Vain. Shadow Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt makes a speech tonight in which he will outline the Conservative Party's commitment to the arts and confirm that they have no plans to discontinue the policy of free admission to museums.