11/01/2013 The Review Show

On Review tonight. When it was made into a musical,

the crickets panned it, now with its hall of Oscar and BAFTA nods,

is Les Miserables the movie going to move millions too.

BBC One has dusted down PG Wodehouse, and sprinkled in

Jennifer Saunders and Timothy Spall. But will it have a 21st century

audience spliting its sides. rather! A story of meat, meat and

more meat, and the corruption it breeds in modern China. In the

newly-translated novel, by the winner of the Nobel Prize for

Literature, Mo Yan. Move over Modern Family, the The New Normal

is snapping at your heels, with a slightly different edgier dynamic.

Those are ugly men. What happens when you take a successful brand

and imitate it. Derry is the first UK City of Culture.

I'm joined tonight by Anne McElvoy the Public Policy Editor of the

Economist. John Mullan Professor of English at University College

London, and the actor and director David Hayman. Victor Hugo's epic

novel, Les Miserables, may be an unlikely choice for a stage musical.

Since it opened in the West End in 1985, the show has been seen by 60

million people in 42 countries around the world. The long-awaited

film version opened today, and is already in the running for eight

Oscars and nine BAFTAs. # Your time is up and your parole

has begun # You know what that means

Yes, it means I'm free At the heart of Les Miserables is

the long-running conflict between the convict Valjean, played by Hugh

Jackman, and the policeman, Javert, played by Russell Crowe. Their

struggle begins after Valjean is released after 19 years of hard

labour. 24601. # My name is Jean Valjean # And I'm Javert

# Do not forget my name # Do not forget me

# 24601 Director Tom Hooper made the brave decision to have his cast

sing live on camera, rather than mime to a prerecorded soundtrack.

You can tell in your bones there is something false or unreal to people

singing to playback. For the audience singing live has a

profound affect on the power and realism of the story. The cast

includes Ricky Hatton as the downtrodden Fantine, and Sacha

Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter as Monsieur and Madame. On

the eve of the uprising, Valjean is living with his ward Cosette, she

falls in love with the young student, Marius, played by Eddie

Redmayne. # My name is Cosette # Cosette I don't know what to say

# Then make no sound # I am lost

Can the screen version have the same impact as the stage show. Does

it point to a more innovative way to turn hit stage shows into

successful movies. David, do you think it is a big

change. Because we have never seen this, as it were, sung through from

a musical to a movie? It is, but it works beautifully. I

think it is a big-hearted, bold, courageous, seductive piece of work.

I think it is terrific. The major jump is Tom Hooper going from his

previous movie, The King's Speech, very much a domestic. He hasn't got

an Oscar nod for director, and he did get it for The King's Speech?

love it, he has done a superb job with a sweeping vision. He's ablely

backed by his cinematographers and others, and by the actors. He

managed to produce a level of raw, intense emotion that permeates the

film, unlike anything I have ever seen before. To do that by opening

up your mouth by singing live, in front of a cast and crew, must have

been one of the most terrifying experience for all of them. I took

my hat off to all of them. I had a squeaky bum time. Does it matter

that some are better singers than others? You have to factor it in.

You could see it from the clip, Russell Crowe doesn't have such a

big or rich voice. Some have a big chest voice, you can get that going

quickly, but not the depth in like in a real singer. Then you come

across with Amanda Seyfried as the young girl, she thrills a bit, she

has a beautiful voice. At first it annoyed me. After a while, I take

David's point. This is an amazing achievement, to sing your way

through this improbable story, that goes on for far too long. There it

is, that was the way it was conceived. It stopped bothering me.

It stopped national curriculuming on. I don't think it mattered that

Russell Crowe couldn't sing. buys into it. The fact that he

can't sing is quite good. I think absolutely, the redeeming thing

about the film, is the effort that the actors are clearly puting into

it. He wants you to notice the effort, because the camera, in a

way, that I found a bit much after a while, really goes in on

everybody's face. Fishly Ricky Hatton, The Phantom Menace, that is

-- particularly Anne Hathaway, Fantine, particularly it is in her

face? I admire the courage and I could see that of the actors doing

it live, that gave an electricity to the film. Why did it move you?

Because it is sentimental. What is wrong with a big dose of sentiment.

Nothing wrong with it ifs had leavened. But, -- If it is leavened.

Is the leverageed not the whole Thenardiers? That is an alternation

of grotesque comedy and it is a great relief. But it is not, the

sentimentalality is bad, I think, it is not the film's fault, it is

there in the score and the script, because it comes with this

crushingly simple psychology, the only interesting character, Javert,

a guy who does bad things out of rectitude. He's mildly interesting,

everything else is so simple. and dried, everybody is either good

or bad and never has a move from good to bad? The great evil is what

they are revolting against, but what is that. In Victor Hugo you

know, goes on and on about it. the point it is they fail, the

uprising fails. Hugh Jackman, you talk about emotion, this is Hugh

Jackman trying to work out who he # How can I face my fellow man

# How can I ever face myself again # My soul belongs to God

# I know I made that bargain long # He gave me hope

# When hope was gone # He gave me strength to journey on

# Who am I? # # Who am I?

# I'm Jean Valjean Ann? Hugh Jackman, he can sing,

though? He can sing. OK the hair is a bit David Essex. There is lots of

things you have to get used to. You have to think this is awful, I was

like, chewing at my sleeve for 20 minutes, then I relaxed into it,

and I enjoyed it much more than the musical I saw many years ago. I'm

not one of those people queuing up for the musical. Despite it I fell

for it. It is interesting in the clip at the beginning the colours

of the outside scenes, how the screen loves a revolution. We

haven't really been able to have one. The pal lal late is brilliant

and the costumes. You don't get a sense that he was trying to make

Paris as it was, it is a stylised set. It is clearly good old

Greenwich brought in again. Just a quick thing about revolution, it

struck me watching it, we know the screen loves revolution, it

provides it. It has been difficult since 1989, you look at Reds and

Warren Beattie and that overdone commemoration, it feels bad since

the fall of the society union, here is a ref lug, we are not sure why

they are on the barricades, but they are cheering when he falls out

of the window with a red flag. film has a profound affect on

millions of people I watched it at 10.30 this morning with my wife and

the packed cinema. The instant it ended they burst into applause,

that doesn't happen very often. What is it about this very, very

slight story that captures people? You say in Hugo it is a big, big

story? All the stuff, it is the same story, but you know, the Hugo

is well known for the fact that he will say, they are going into the

sewers, want to know about that, he will tell you, wanter loo, a battle,

he will tell you all about -- Waterloo, a battle, he will tell

you about it. All the original information is in the novel. Now we

have this one, the whole musical on film come and go, Chicago is a big

hit Nine, then Sweeney today, then this sung through. Can you imagine

-- then Sweden Todd, this sung through. -- Sweeney Todd, this sung

through, I can't imagine VIVA forever going through, will they

want Tom Hooper to want to do it, but will they go back? I don't

think you can back after that. You have to have an A-list cast and the

resources Tom Hooper had. He had $66 million, and already in the two

months before Christmas it has taken $67 million. He will get the

resources again. As I say, it is in cinemas from today. As all the

genres practitioners will tell you, television comedy is knowor ously

difficult to nail, particularly on -- notoriously difficult to nail,

particularly on the mainstream channels, probably that is why BBC

has stayed safe by returning to a known author and a cast of familiar

faces. Take one beloved British comic writer, add a Stately Home,

and mix thoroughly with the cream of British comedy acting talent.

The result is BBC One's brand new period comedy, Blandings. Based on

the popular PG Wodehouse stories, set in the fictional castle of the

same name. Blandings is aimed squarely at the British family's

Sunday teatime. The stories concern the Stately Home's inhabitant, in

particular the affable and bumbling Lords Clarence Emsworth, played by

Timothy Spall. Bring me a contraption, chain, ding-ding,

rubber things that go round and round, bicycle! Clarence's pursuit

of happiness is perpetually interrupted by a series of

blundering scrape, induced by his dysfuntional -- scrapes, induced by

his dysfuntional family and himself. The cast includes David Walliams

and Jennifer Saunders at his reproachful sister, Connie. If you

wear that hat to the Shropshire show, I shall eviscerate you with a

small blunt spoon adapted for the purpose. Hat, patrician-bearing and

chop, chop. ITV enjoyed great success with their Wodehouse

adaptation, Jeeves and Wooster, back in the 1980s, starring Hugh

Laurie and Stephen Fry, which may be why the length of time before

revisiting Wodehouse. The decision to return to this rib-tickling

writer, could be down to certain other very successful country house

dramas. Blandings has car crashes too. But this series aims to soften

the stiff upper lip into a smile, so have the makers succeeded in

producing a new treat for all the family. Oh rather.

Or rather not, which is it for you? Oh rather not, please, please, can

we switch over. I thought it was like being trapped in a Boris

Johnson joke for 30 minutes. I think there is a way that it can

really start to get on your nerves. I like Wodehouse on the page, I do

find the adaptations less funny than some people would really

acknowledge, many people find it funnier than I do. There was

something about this, it was soft round the edges. They had lost the

edge and subversiveness in Wodehouse. The blasted big, once

you get a pig in English comedy you are lost any way. It was moulding

into a private function somewhere, I felt they had lost any spirit

that they had set out to capture. Great performances by Spall and

Jennifer Saunders, but it couldn't rescue it for me. You are a bit of

a Wodehouse officinado on the page, were you worried by this

adaptation? I was dreading it, and particularly when I saw it was half

an hour long. The Blandings books, the, and there is a lot of them,

and there is a spaciousness, Victor Hugo tells you about the sewers,

what PG Wodehouse is great, he tells you about some people having

a drink before dinner, then you get a wonderful page about what is the

best thing to drink before dinner. The best thing about Wodehouse is

the sentences, he writes brilliantly well. I was slightly

dreading it. But actually I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it as I think

it is being broadcast, as kind of family entertainment. There was

just enough of slapstick, it isn't very funny, there was just enough

of the dialogue left in it. much of Wodehouse is actually left

in it? The best lines in it, and the things that made me laugh out

loud, "Harrow, I thought he must have suffered corruption in his

youth" said by somebody who must have gone to Eton. God how we

laughed! This is BBC One fare on a Sunday night, you talk about family,

I'm really not sure. Is it because people think there is a huge

appetite for costume. You have just done Paradise, and you are doing it

again, for the Downton crew, do they think because you dress people

in costumes and give them funny lines it will work. For me it

doesn't have the bite of the early car Michael, and the Stephen Fry

and Hugh Laurie? That was partly a compression thing, that these plots,

these absurd plots, that always involved somebody getting into a

Skype, and somebody else trying to get them out of it. They just

didn't have room to do that. Do you think the characterisations weren't

allowed to breathe? They were allowed to breathe, but they come

across as a bunch of people who have 200 years of inbreeding from a

small gene pool, it probably isn't far from the truth. They are all

barking mad. It is delightful, it is light-hearted, it is completely

inoffensive, I think it is quite right for 6.00pm on a Sunday

evening. I wonder if it is, I had this throwback feeling, it belonged

to thater rar and for me, the 90s one, which was rather better, to

the Manor Born, I wonder if people watch television in the same way at

the same time, whether that family slot will be charming them. That is

what they are hoping and expecting. That is a cruel and unusual

punishment for your kids. We have David Walliams, Paloma *Faith, they

are throwing great actors at this and a lot of money at it too?

can't complain. The acting is very good. I empathise madly with

Jennifer Saunders. The slapstick is too self-conscious for me. It is

soft as well, it is just a little bit muddy at the edges I think, as

well, even though the cast is strong. Let's face it, there could

be 23 episodes. 23? It is very much defined of what you are about to

see by the music and style of all the graphics, do you think that

sends the right signal? The music was the one thing I didn't like.

That was trying to sort of some how jazz and jogle you along into

seeing how whacky and Zaney it was. It was too much a would-be

assistance. I have reminded that Jeeves and Wooster had 23 episodes,

and Blandings could go on for a while. When you have something like

this you have to throw your back into it to help people understand

what it is. What is the audience at 6.00pm on a Sunday night. Will it

be the audience that will sit there together and say let's watch

Blandings? It is a strange beast? It is a strange beast. It is not a

drama. It is not Paradise and Downton, it is not laugh-out-loud

funny? It is not funny enough. John knows it better than I do. I didn't

feel when they had a great line you didn't feel it came with a

whipcrack. You it felt Wodehhousian, but not cracking great Wodehouse.

Do you feel it is that it will bring Wodehouse back into fashion?

I don't know, it might make people, I think the Blandings books aren't

read very much, they are very enjoyable, and probably if it is on

TV more people will read them. It is clear that Ann thinks that he

actually will survive this, rather than prosper from it. You want

Boris Johnson instead. He's a huge master of the English language, I

will give that to Wodehouse. first episode of Blandings is on

BBC One at 6.30pm. The award of the Nobel Peace Prize in literature

last year to Ai Weiwei was a controversial one. While -- Mo Yan,

is a controversial one. Salman Rushdie and Ai Weiwei criticised

the award to a man who has refused to condemn state cens sorship in

China, and others praising him. It raised his profile in the west, and

his 2003 novel, Pow!, has just been published in English. Pow!, set in

the Chinese countryside in the late 1980s on wards, is an absurdly

comic tale of capitalism and corruption intruding on the values

of rural life. The central character recounts the story of his

childhood to a wise old monk. As a boy Xiaotong is renowned for his

huge appetite for meat. "To be a carnivore you must have a

prodigious stomach, and you were born with the smom McOf a tiger or

wolf. The heavens have sent you down, my friend, for one purpose

only, that is to eat meat". Meat is way of life in Xiaotong's village,

where a temple honours the Meat God, and a carnivore festival is held.

The opening of a new meat plant brings prosperity to former farm

workers. I hear the Government has brought Slaughterhouse as an

enterprise zone to attract foreign investment, high rise buildings and

factories are popping out of the land, a vast man made lake has

appeared out of nowhere, and quickly become home to tourists

skiffs, shaped like docks. Fancy new villas are springing up

creating a sort of fairyland. The men who live in them drive fancy

cars, Mercedes, Lexus s or at least Redmayne. The new factory success

relies on unscrupulous methods of production, and money made by any

means possible. As a satire on greed and gluttony, Mo Yan's Pow!

Contains many memorable visceral descriptions. As an examination of

the changing face of China, is it spicy enough? Or some what bland

fare? So, John, two narratives in this book, one in ittalics, which

is magic realist, they are in a temple with an old monk, and the

other is this story of this boy, who adores meat. Do they drive the

story on, one on to each other? It is interesting right at the end of

the novel, author and then afterwards, explicitly says what

his model has been for this book, which is Gunter Grass's Tiananmen,

which is, I think, a wonderful novel. In which, a certain kind of

very -- Tin Man, which I think is a wonderful novel. In which a certain

kind of autobiograical novel, which is twined in telling the story of

Germany as part of its history. Here he has separated those out. I

think, I suppose I think that is a bad decision. They don't enliven it.

They are brought together at the end formally speaking. They don't

enliven each other at all. You get no sense of any, well, you don't

desperately look forward at looking at the next one. You know the one

in eyalic, will never really change that -- itallics will never change

very much, or take you anywhere? is an extraordinary piece of

imagination, but seriously indigestible. About three-quarters

of the way through, I had had to take a break for a few day, I

thought I couldn't stomach any more. Did you not go out for Chinese!

I didn't. Every character is stinking of blood and guts and

offal. It is an extraordinary heady, heady rich, rich piece. You were

talking about it at the end, what he was doing in this post script

saying it was about the telling of a story, rather than a story itself.

It was the reputation, like an oral tradition, one long story about

meat? I think it meant a bit more, you suggest there. I had returned

from China a little while ago, I just happened to be there for work

for a couple of week. Everyone who goes there are from the west says

the same thing, this society is developling so fast. I couldn't put

my finger on it, there is an overfaith in the young that they

will take them to the dawn of technological change. The young

person in the book ends up in this horrible meat factory and has to

inject the cows with water, it is gross. I saw what he was doing

there. You see it in the academic pushing the kids, I wondered if

there was not a metaphor there the way they are pushing the generation,

in order to get something for themselves. It doesn't feel right,

it feels a bit unwholesome. That is what all that meat imagery was

about. The other thing was about this eating and meat. Consumption?

You realise consumption is massive, they are always trying to force you

to sit down and eat. There is something at first that is nice and

and friendly, it also becomes a pressure point, it is about proving

what you have and how rich you are getting. I think he evoked that

really well. Did you get a sense in which he was being in any way

critical of the particular, or he was making a bigger point about

corruption and consumption and so forth. This is the Ai Weiwei point,

that he's not actually writ kal of his own country? I don't think he -

- critical of his own country? I don't think he has a duty to be

critical at all. The trouble with what Ann says, he would want us to

think that, that it is all a metaphor. But is it? A metaphor for

what? One thing I felt, which perhaps, I started by thinking this

was my ignorance, but I ended up thinking it was part of what the

book was doing. I was thinking, when is this set, where is this

set? Are we, what bits of history have we gone through? I'm reading,

I'm in a medieval Chinese world, suddenly in come TV vans with

satellite, and motorcycle gangs and Chinese guys in suits and shades.

It is the whole corruption of meat pumping it full of formaldehyde and

water, it must be a metaphor for corruption in China, but -- is it.

He has the corruption in the local big wig who gets to sleep with

anyone he wants to, who has made a lot of money from injecting water

into meat. Where does it take us? There is a weakness in him that he

isn't a dissident writer. He doesn't stand up to the authorities,

he says some pretty duff things about censorship being the same as

anti-terror measures at airports. In that way he's reprehensible,

he's not a Weiwei, but he is a juvenile of satire on China. That

is the way he's presenting his critque, I wish he would go further,

but it is better than you are subjecting. It is a very complex

metaphor. Clearly it was decided he should get it for literature?

don't really give it for literature. I think formal, just judging it on,

I agree that some of our judgments cannot be separated from the

political one, and I share Ann's political thoughts about him.

the question of literature? Formally, I think that the novel is,

as David describes it, it is a really difficult novel to like. Not

because you are being showing a grim experience and you are being

made to go through it, but because it is incredibly repetitive, and

the structure makes it so. And very dense, he creates a very, very cold

icey world, no human beings have any redeeming features at all, but

there are moments of tenderness, particularly early in the book. The

scene where he goes with his sister to the station to find the father,

that is moving, but then it disappears. Everybody else is on

the make. It is like the satires in Russia about the new economic

period, they have done the communism and go into this mad,

hypercapitalism, to try to overcompensate, and they get it all

wrong. That is the point, of course they are not endearing. Do you

think there is a slight loss in translation. This is his regular

translator. Do you think that perhaps what we are reading when we

are talking about the way he actually writes, we are getting it

in translation? I wondered a lot about that. They are even the same

phrases and simplys used. I thought is this -- I thought this is it,

who are we to criticise the translation. You didn't get the

richness of prose writing here. It is simply impossible to know

whether that is because we will never be able to get at it. And so

on to your second sitcom of the night. In shows such as 2Point4

Childre, My Family, and In With The Flynns, the traditional family are

an instantly familiar precinct for mainstream comedy. A new series

from Ryan Murphy, the creator of Nip/Tuck and Glee, it follows the

steps of the modern family, by taking a more flamboyant family

unit. The New Normal is based on Murphy's own experience of having a

child by surrogate mother, it stars Justin Bartha from The Hangover as

an odd couple, daifld and Bryan, who discover one thing missing from

their life. I saw the minature person, whose skin was flawless by

the way, I really got it, I want us to have baby clothes and a baby to

wear them. After a series of disasters in the search for

possible surrogates, including a cameo from Gwyneth Paltrow, they

end up meeting Goldblatt, a down- on-her-luck single mum, who is

looking to fund her long life ambition. Before you and daddy

accidentally had me, what did you want to be? I wanted to be a lawyer.

They all come together to form a new normal family unit, but

Goldblatt's bigotted grandmother, played by Ellen Barkin, does her

best to get in the way. With her racist retorts and homophobic

outbursts, she's the show's outlook for criticism of same-sex attitudes.

Seems like they love each other. Now with the PDA, those ass campers

are there. Those are lesbians. Jueingly men. Although it is

stirring up controversial in the states, one channel refused to run

the show, the campaign of One Million Moms is running a campaign

against the network. Do you think it is a good idea to bring a kid

into the world from a non- traditional family. I know another

one, an African-American raised by a grandma, that person seems to be

doing fine. Barack Obama. No Mariah Carey, your example works too.

this sitcom of traditional values in an unveingsal family, or has it

taken a liberal step too far to take the audience with it. Face it,

abnormal is the new normal. Yes, but, Ann, you know, My Family,

this is his own experience of what is happening here, Modern Family

that is good, now they are thinking let's do it and make it tougher.

You give Ellen Barkin lots of racist hope folkic lines, right up

there, nowhere to go from there -- homophobic lines right up there,

nowhere to go from there? It can't decide to preach at you or sniing

certificate at what left-leaning Americans any of as bad. It is an

inverse tea party. She's set up so much as the homophobic hate-filled

figure, at one point she is told to go back to the south. It is like

why not slag off half the country while you are at it. It can't stop

preaching at you, it has some funny lines, and in the clip there, it

has that ping-pong, that great facility of ironic modern American

wit. It undermines. It is too certain of its thesis. Which is

called "abnormal" gays with children is a great children.

are such good guys. Exactly. There is no complexity. Modern Family are

stupid and bitchy and make mistakes, it is genius writing, this just

feels locked together like Lego. thought it was terrible. Given that

it has that sort of patterner of ping-pong wit, I'm mixing my

metaphors. It has the high production value American sitcom

thing, if it was British it would be shambolic, no it is American, it

will be very crisp. But, beneath that, they have separated out the

sort of biley stuff and given them all to the grandmother and made her

just abusive, and then everybody else is smug, self-regarding,

centencious, just be who you are. It is a powerful tool for

recruiting for the Tea Party. Count me in. All this idea Gwyneth

Paltrow she's not good enough, whatever, the idea you just want a

kid, just get the surrogate. You have lots of money, and send her to

law school as well, it will be fine. Its a bit ridiculous. I had to

watch it twice. First time through I thought I don't like it, it is

too two dimensional for me I watched it again and got more from

it. It doesn't know quite what it is. Is it a liberal comedy about

contemporary matters, or does it have a genuine black edge that is

really hitting its target. I think it falls between more than two

stools. Even a liberal comedy needs to do the screw ups of liberalism,

these guys aren't screwed up at all. It makes you feel how great social

comedy is about difficulties, that goes back from Steptoe and Sons and

Girls. There is no difficulty here. It is just like, yeah she can go

into Legally Blonde, the little girl from Little Miss Sunshine.

Everyone will be slotted into mice world. You lose any sense it has a

driving message, if it has. On some of the individual performances, you

talk about the little girl, what is great about her? She's wonderful.

You are right, just like Little Miss Sunshine, she has a moral

voice, where she will make judgment on people. If there is any

character development it might be with her. That is bad, if you are

relying on, however talented. eight-year-old. If things are gone

wrong home at home when the kids are right. One moment's hope when

we thought she had written on the furniture, the child had written on

the furniture, that was great, there would be an anarchic strain,

no, guess who had written on the furniture, no, it was nasty Granny

as well. That keep going. We are in a situation where you have all

these hits like Modern Family, it spins out something like this, and

Glee something he will. Where is this writing, is it team writing. I

used to think team writing is a great idea. I hate team writing. It

just produces endless episodes of endlessly short of polished,

immaculate ping-pong, contentless, and often really totally unrisky

comedy. You read my mind. One of the characters being abused by

Ellen Barkin? She has wandered in, she says funny things. But, there

again, if you want to have the properly preachy liberal comedy,

she's in an odd position. It seems uncertain about what it wants to do.

It is interesting, these long- running, team-scripted comedies,

they do have difficulty. If you look at the fall off in Glee, there

is a hardcore of glee fans, it is a-- Glee fans, people get used to

it. You can see a few of these you can think that is it for me, you

don't have to see it through to the end, there is no investment in the

characters, they may fall off a cliff. They may, but episode two is

on E4 next Thursday at 9.00pm. After the back of Liverpool's

European City of Culture in 2008, and Glasgow back in 1990. The

Department of Culture, Media and Sport launches a new initiative

this year, the first UK City of Culture.

The new year announced a new chapter the City of Derry, which in

2013, celebrate not only its 400th anniversary, but also its status as

the first ever UK City of Culture. The idea for this new accolade came

back in 2008, when Liverpool spent a year as the European Capital of

Culture, with great success. The year was filled with spectacular

events, and an enviable cultural cast list that brought in millions

of extra visitors, and a 500% return on investment. Liverpool

will never be the same again. the tide of enthusiasm, and figures

that were hard to ignore, the Government capitalised swiftly,

announcing a UK version of the prize. The conversations -- the UK

City of Culture capital is Derry. Derry, also known as London Derry,

is determined to make an impact. With a �16 million programme of

some 40 events, which includes the London Symphony Orchestra, the

Royal Ballet and the Turner Prize. Can this politically divided city

come together to produce a real economic and cultural legacy?

We can go back to Liverpool, just to get a couple of Liverpool

statisticss, three million first- time visitors to Liverpool, 66% of

residents took part, visitor numbers are up by 50%. That doesn't

even take us back as far as Glasgow, a huge success. It was the greatest

success, I was involved in it. It was fantastic and put the city on

the map. I think this is great initiative, by the way. Anything

that pumps money into the arts, or artistic endeavour has to be

alloweded, it is great going to Derry. Hopefully it will put the

divide -- applauded, it is great going to Derry, hopefully it will

put the divided city on the pap. extraordinary leg -- The map.

extraordinary legacy in Glasgow? There was extraordinary figures. A

lot of companies were created that are still in existencement we are

still benefiting from the legacy. Suddenly it freed people up. There

was no longer shameful in any way to be involved in the arts. It was

sexy, the feminine side of the city came to the fore. The big thing for

me travelling around Europe, the notion of Glasgow, and how it was.

The old fashioned notions of what Glasgow was like had started to go,

it was not a mean city any more, or the knife capital of the world,

people came, lots of short-haul flights. Peter Brook was here,

there was lots and lots of work. The difference is, though, that the

UK City of Culture won't be advertised presumably in the world?

They will have a marketing tool. A note of scepticism on the

expenditure, slightly contrary to David. It is not true that money is

always good if it is put in the arts. The money has to come out of

the arts in the first place, you have a certain pot, DCMS has it, it

is our tax money, call ago spade a spade here. It is coming out of

something else, it doesn't exist in thin air. You have to look at the

amount of expenditure, many millions to get it off the ground.

They hope to recoup them. Some of those calculation are fanciful.

Liverpool figures would show it was a huge economic return for the city.

I would question some of those figures. Once you have committed

money to cultural products in cities, you will be amazed there is

always a return on investment, put 40%. I suspect that is slightly

high. I'm not very much in favour of them doing in Derry, if you are

going to do it is a good thing. There is this problem with what is

a City of Culture. Really what we are doing it to places where we

have a bad conscious about. It is quite a good thing if it is going

to keep going t should go to Durham, unappreciated Cathedral city, my

home town, Norwich made a strong bid this year. We can't continue to

do the guilt and conscience safling. What is happening with some of the

promotion, is it is about different art events coming in to Derry,

rather than Derry doing it for itself. What should the mix be, 50-

50? Derry is a small town, 1 10,000 people? Looking at the website

there did seem to be stuff generated from within the city. It

is an interesting, arguably a high- risk choice, you heard the

announcement there. Derry, Londonderry. If culture has done

one thing in Northern Ireland, Ulster, over the years, it is to

separate people, and if you look at the official announcements, some

might think propaganda for this event, there is lots of stuff about

synergies, connecting, there is whole events called Connecting

Communities. If that is going to happen, it would be worth spending

a lot of money on it, is that going to happen. It is not universally

well received, but the year is young. There is going to be lots of,

you were going to be in a Brian Friel play but you can't, there is

lots of work going on. The play is coming to Edinburgh, and going to

Newcastle and a couple of other cities in England, it is great. It

will spread beyond Derry. You might as well be up front and saying you

are doing peace process plus or minus. The thing that made me think,

you know I'm grudgey about these things, I will back it because the

Continuity IRA says it is a terrible thing and you should

oppose it. I thought I'm for it now. Then you might as well just say, it

is a bit of the chiend of cherry on the cake, and things are -- kind of

cherry on the cake and things are difficult in Northern Ireland. We

still want the peace process to succeed, you have to be explicit

about it. It is wrapped up too much with confusion about whether it is

really about culture or, as John says, really about trying to

promote cross community understanding. I think the most

people it brings into the city, that are not of the city,

travelling around, will be fantastic. The huge amount of

talent in that area as well. The huge amount of playwrighting,

musical talent and so forth. Let's give it a shout out, there is a

link for more information about Derry's year-long programme is on

the website alongside all the items. My thanks to my guests. Matter that

will be here next week to look at Quentin Tarrentino's new film,

Django Unchained. The London Underground celebrated its 150th

birthday. We thought we would celebrate it, that as well as

moving millions of people a year, it also commissions art. This

celebration has inspired a new set # When I get to Warwick avenue

# Meet me by the entrance of the tube

# We can talk things over a little time

# Promise me # You won't stay by the line