Front Row - 26/03/2009

Presented by Kirsty Lang. In a new cinema documentary, Tyson, the former world heavyweight champion boxer Mike Tyson talks candidly about his career and the highs and lows. The film's director, James Toback, discusses the film and how he managed to get Mike Tyson to open up. Critic Andrew Dickson reviews Dido, Queen of Carthage, Christopher Marlowe's version of the tale of Aeneas' tragic love for Dido after he escapes the fall of Troy. Fifty years after his death, how does the language of the American crime writer Raymond Chandler stand up? Novelist Sarah Dunant and crime writer Mark Billingham reassess Chandler's style. Sparkie the budgie was an unlikely star of the 1950s: a talking budgie who sang with a Geordie accent. He's now become the inspiration for an opera, written by Michael Nyman, who talks to Kirsty ahead of the world premiere tonight in Berlin.