Front Row Folgen

Shappi Khorsandi is the first guest in a week of programmes from the Edinburgh Festival. On stage in front of a live audience in the BBC's Big Blue Tent, she discusses her new show Mistress and Misfit, about Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson's mistress, Lady Emma Hamilton.In Nassim, Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour sets out to teach the audience his native language Farsi in a show which features a different performer from the Festival each day. So how does he prepare when the deal is that performers have not even seen the script before stepping out in front of an audience?The former National Poet of Wales, Gillian Clarke, discusses her new poetry collection Zoology. As the Edinburgh International Festival and Fringe celebrate their 70th birthday this year, the International Festival's director Fergus Lenehan is joined by 90-year-old Dr Pamela Epps, who has attended every festival in the city since 1947.Presenter John Wilson Producer Jerome Weatherald.

A special edition exploring the life and legacy of the playwright Joe OrtonLeonie Orton, Joe Orton's youngest sister, has written a memoir of her life, I Had It In Me, in which she describes the childhood in Leicester she shared with Joe Orton and how his death led her to question and change her life. She meets Samira at the Pork Pie Library which she and Joe used to regularly visit. Dr Emma Parker has co-curated two exhibitions inspired by Joe Orton: What the Artist Saw: Art Inspired by the Life and Work of Joe Orton, is on at the New Walk Museum and Art Gallery in Leicester until 22 October and Crimes of Passion: The Story of Joe Orton is on at the National Justice Museum in Nottingham until 1 OctoberSally Norman, co-founder and co-director of Soft Touch Arts in Leicester, and her assistant Jenna Forbes, discuss their new community arts exhibition Breaking Boundaries: Joe Orton and Me which is on at Soft Touch Arts until 8 September.Theatre critic John Lahr, author of the acclaimed Joe Orton biography, Prick Up Your Ears, discusses Orton's skill and significance as a playwright.The actor Sheila Hancock shares her memories of performing in Joe Orton's first stage play, Entertaining Mr Sloane, during its first Broadway run in 1965.The artistic director of Curve theatre, Nikolai Foster, talks about his experience of staging Joe Orton's final play, What The Butler Saw, at Curve earlier this year.Presenter: Samira Ahmed Producer: Ekene Akalawu.

Actor Henry Goodman talks about his latest stage role as the celebrated portrait painter Lucian Freud in Looking at Lucian, a new play by Alan Franks.The number of published British black and minority ethnic authors writing for young adults is lamentably low. A new collection of short stories and poetry, A Change is Gonna Come, is setting out to change that - the collection includes work by established YA writers like Tanya Byrne and Patrice Lawrence but also introduces four new unpublished BAME writers. The writer Nikesh Shukla and The Bookseller's Online Editor Sarah Shaffi discuss who are the rising stars in diversity in British YA fiction and look at the publishing industry's attempts to improve their representation.British-born, Bangkok-based best-selling author Lawrence Osborne's novels often focus on travellers coming unstuck in foreign lands, and his new book Beautiful Animals, is no exception. A thriller set amongst the tourists and wealthy expats on a Greek Island, it explores what happens when two young women stumble upon a Syrian immigrant washed up on the shore.For our Queer Icons series, Isaac Julien champions Derek Jarman's film about the Renaissance artist Caravaggio.Presenter: Kirsty Lang Producer: Hilary Dunn.