The South Bank Show
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First Air DateJan 14, 1978
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Production
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Rotten tomato56%
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Original titleThe South Bank Show
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ReleaseJan 14, 1978
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Overview
The South Bank Show is a television arts magazine show that was produced by ITV between 1978 and 2010. A new series began on Sky Arts from 27 May 2012. Presented by Melvyn Bragg, the show aims to bring both high art and popular culture to a mass audience.
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Music Supervisor
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Producer
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Casts
Season 1 ( 1978-01-14)
Paul McCartney/surrealist exhibition
Paganini Superstar
Roy Minton
David Hockney
Dennis Potter
John Peel/Jane Glover
Arabian Days (Edna O'Brien)/Quentin Crisp
Jacques Loussier
Ken Dodd
Georges Simenon
Horowitz at the White House
Carl Perkins/Morgan horses
Carry On with Paul Morissey (Carry On ... films)
Search for Shaw
Harold Pinter
Satyajit Ray/John Williams/Ralph McTell
Portrait of a Conductor: Herbert Von Karajan
Freddie Young
Frank Auerbach
Mayerling Ballet
John Osborne on Wardle's book on Devine/Pearl (radio play)
Ingmar Bergman at 60
Hullabaloo over George and Bonnie's Pictures (1)
Hullabaloo over George and Bonnie's Pictures (2)
Season 2 ( 1978-11-26)
Tom Stoppard
Grace Under Pressure (Anthony Burgess on Hemingway)
Woody Allen
Anatomy of an Opera: Jonathan Miller's Figaro
Rhythm of Resistance (South African music)
Harmony of the Spheres (Neil Ardley)
Circus Clowns/Schubert recital by Richter
Royal Shakespeare Company on tour
Brimstone & Treacle (Dennis Potter) / John McLaughlin, a Musical Journey
The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith / Edward Gorey / Gunter Grass
Michael Cimino / Alan Bennett, Stephen Frears
Gordon Williams, Alan Sharp, Eddie Boyd
Derek Boshier / Ingrid Bergman, Ingmar Bergman
Neil Simon
Beryl Cook / Cloud Nine rehearsals
Graham Sutherland
Darryl Way / Howard Brenton
The Europeans (film) / Joseph Heller
Asian Arts festival
Billy Connolly
Jessye Norman
Rough Trade (record label) / Allen Jones
Scum (film) / Keith Jarrett
Michael Tippett (90 min.)
Season 3 ( 1979-12-02)
Francis Ford Coppola
Royal Shakespeare Company masterclass (1)
Royal Shakespeare Company masterclass (2)
Talking Heads
Love and the Ice-Cream Vendor
Fay Weldon / Richard Hogart on Northern Ireland in drama
Merce Cunningham
Elegies for the Deaths of Three Spanish Poets
A Time There was ... (Benjamin Britten)
The Greene Adaptations (Graham Greene films)
Salsa (Puerto Rican music)
The Worlds of Edward Bond
Yehudi Menuhin and Stephane Grappelli / Kinglsey Amis
new British rock films / The Tin Drum (film)
Roman Polanski
Tom Wolfe
Andrew Wyeth
Angus Wilson
Jane Austen (film)
Season 4 ( 1980-11-09)
Arthur Miller
William Golding
Akira Kurosawa
Stravinsky's The Firebird
No Need to Lie
The Passion (National Theatre's updating of medieval plays)
Toni Morrison
The Trespasser (film)
Don Juan in Hell
poetry workshop
Martin Scorsese
Elizabeth Taylor / John Hubbard
Bob Fosse
Robert Redford / Martin Amis
Verity Bargate / Howard Hodgkin
At the Haunted End of the Day: the Life of Sir William Walton
Gore Vidal
The Roots of the Tree (Ermanno Olmi)
Colin Welland
Christopher Logue / Phillip King
Lulu's Last Act (Berg opera)
Dame Ninette De Valois / David Hockney on Picasso
Clive James / Craig Raine
Soviet Art
Rhythm and Blues (The Blues Band, Dr. Feelgood, Nine Below Zero, Paul Jones)
Music for a City: Venice
Season 5 ( 1981-11-01)
The French Lieutenant's Woman
Elvis Costello
Old Glory: the Journey and the Book
Ian McKellan / Ian McEwan
Brian Moore / Patrick Caulfield
A Talent to Vex: John Osborne
Mama Lu Parks
Bernard D'Ascoli / Theatre of the 8th Day
Milos Forman
Germaine Greer
Pauline Kael / George Steiner's The Portage to San Cristobal of AH
Jerry Lieber and Mike Stoller
Blacck Theatre Cooperative / Laurie Anderson

Guys and Dolls (at the National Theatre)
Richard Alston's Bellezza Flash
Peter Maxwell-Davies
Saul Bellow
Indian wallpainting
Stravinski (1)
Stravinski (2)
Julian Lloyd-Webber
Miles Davis / Robert Nye
Caught in the Act (Pillar to Post at Wormwood Scrubs)
Joseph Papp / James Galway
Werner Herzog
Why Don't I Love Opera Anymore (by Stephen Oliver)
Phillip Larkin
Season 6 ( 1982-10-17)
Laurence Olivier, a Life (1)
Laurence Olivier, a Life (2)
Peter Gabriel
Bruce Chatwin
Patricia Highsmith
Steven Spielberg

Gospel at Colonus
Simone De Beauvoir
Barry Flannigan / Seamus Heaney
David Hare
Agnes De Mille
Handel's Semele (by the Royal Opera House)
Sam Fuller
Local Hero (film)
R.K. Narayan
Ivo Pogorelich

John Le Carré
Choirs and Places Where They Sing
William Trevor
Gene Hackman
Keith Waterhouse
Robert Lowell / Benjamin Britten's Quartettino
Cowboy Art
Jiri Kylian
Producing Don Giovanni
Ken Russell's View of The Planets
Season 7 ( 1983-10-16)
Piper's Way
Yuri Lyubimov
Jack Lemmon
Catherine Cookson
Lillian Gish/Glen Baxter
Alberto Moravia
Ian Hamilton Finlay/Lord Gowrie
Barry Tuckwell: Master of the Horn
Trevor Griffiths
Weather Report
Claudio Arrau
Kathy Acker
Ralph Vaughan Williams
Sir Ernst Gombrich
Michael Frayn
Ed McBain
David Bintley: New Ballet at Sadler's Wells
Stephen Sondheim
Elisabeth Vellacott / DeCocoa, Hot Chocolate

adaptation of Ivy Compton Burnett's Elders and Betters
Kipling (one-man play with Alec McGowen)
Anthony Caro
Season 8 ( 1984-10-07)
Alan Bennett
McCartney's Broad Street
The Forming of the Phoenix (Phoenix Dance Company)
Paolo and Vittorio Taviani
Norman Nicholson
Joseph Heller
Mstislav Rostropovich

Max Wall
Alan Bleasdale
Anthony Burgess on D.H. Lawrence
Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex
Marc Chagall
David Lean: a Life in Film
Simon Rattle / finale of Messiaen's Turangalila Symphony
Little Richard
George Malcolm on Scarlatti
Silent Partners: Second Stride Dance Company
Michael Crawford/Billy Bragg
David Mamet
Olivier Messiaen: The Music of Faith
The Cotton Club (night club)
Prez (jazz opera about Lester Young)
Francis Bacon
George Steiner on Vienna at the turn of the century
Season 9 ( 1985-10-06)
Sir Alec Guinness
Peter Ackroyd's Hawksmoor
Ian McKellen, Diary of a Year
Theatre of Comedy workshop
Pete Townshend: After the Fire
Sir Stephen Spender
Marguerite Duras
Karole Armitage
Peter Shaffer
John Cleese
Vladimir Ashkenazy
Paul Schrader
Purcell's Dido and Aenaes
Patrick Heron
Blue Note Records
Michala Petri
Elisabeth Schwarzkopf
Absolute Beginners (film)
Arthur Boyd
Hal Prince: Rethinking the Musical
British Soap Operas

Hull Truck Theatre Company
Velvet Underground
Al Jolson
Season 10 ( 1986-10-05)
John Mortimer
Michael Powell
Truman Capote
Fay Godwin
The Andrew Lloyd-Webber Story

Agatha Christie, How Did She Do It?
The Dream is Over (Christopher Bruce ballet on John Lennon)
Arts Review '86
Anthony Hopkins / David Hare
Philip Glass
Alvin Ailey Dance Theater
Anthony Green: RA, a Love Story
birth of Frankenstein and Dracula
Thomas Allen
The Wooster Group

The London Underground in art
Barbara Dickson
Penguin Cafe Orchestra
Turner at the Tate
George V. Higgins
Peter York lecture
The Aida File: The Making of the Opera (1)
The Aida File: Aida Performance (2)
Season 11 ( 1987-10-04)
Maria Callas
Toni Morrison
The Smiths
Andy Warhol
Frank Rich / Suzanne Vega
Sir Terence Conran
Gore Vidal
African music / Russian theatre
Sir George Solti
Eric Clapton
Arts Review '87
The Last Emperor (1988 film)
Australian Aboriginies
Boogie Woogie Music
The Golden Age of Television
George Barker
Jackson Pollack
Lenny Henry
Peter Dickinson
A Day on The Grand Canal with the Emperor of China
Nicuragua: Poets as Politicans
Ken Russell's ABC of British Music
Doris Lessing
Sir Peter Hall's last National Theatre production
Season 12 ( 1988-09-25)
The Art of Walt Disney
Bernard Shaw
Under Milk Wood
Toulouse-Lautrec
David Puttnam
David Hockney
Two Women in Three Dimensions (Wendy Taylor, Nicola Hicks)
Bristol WWII bombing raids reenactment
Raymond Chandler
Neil Jordan
John Houseman
David Bailey
Derek Walcott
Patrick Leigh Fermor
National Training Orchestra
Christopher Hampton
Istvan Szabo
Robert Redford
Tony Palmer on the concerto
Ben Elton
John Burnett
Put Blood in the Music (New York avant garde music)
John Ogdon
Sir William Golding
Season 13 ( 1989-09-17)
Martin Amis
Dustin Hoffman, Sir Peter Hall
Jimi Hendrix
Tom Keneally in Eritrea
Ken Russell
Steven Berkoff
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Fitzrovia
Dame Edna Everage
Evelyn Glennie
Peter Brook
Arts Review '89
Boris Pasternak
Sir David Lean, Robert Bolt
Christopher Hogwood
Chinua Achebe
Hans Werner Henze
Jock Tamson's Bairns (Gerry Mulgrew, Liz Lochhead)
Yuri Bashmet
DV8 Physical Theatre
Mark Morris: the Hidden Soul of Harmony
Carl Davis, Temba
Vivienne Westwood
Hindemith
Robert Altman
Season 14 ( 1990-09-02)
George Michael
Peter Ackroyd on Dickens
Spike Lee
Salman Rushdie
Roy Lichtenstein
Ken Russell on Anton Bruckner
Clear Cool Crystal Streams (Irish rock music)
John Updike
East German writers
Alan Parker
Cameron Mackintosh
Spitting Image
The Talis Scholars
Stan Laurel
August Wilson
Oscar Marzaroli
Anne-Sophie Mutter
Bonfire of the Vanities (1991 film)
Willard White
The Five Blind Boys of Alabama / R.S. Thomas
Steve Martin
Rudolph Nureyev
Kiri Te Kanawa
Season 15 ( 1991-09-15)
Private Eye
David Lodge
Terry Gilliam
Neil Simon
Heinrich Schiff
Seamus Heaney
John Osborne
Dame Britain (Vera Lynn)
Arthur Miller
Jose Carreras, a Life Story
Dame Kiri Te Kanawa
Arts Review '91

Douglas Adams
Lenny Henry Hunts the Funk
Hakan Hardenberger
Cecilia Bartoli
Les Murray
Colin Thubron
Pet Shop Boys
Paula Rego
Noel Coward
Anthony Hopkins
Terence Davis
Making Naked Lunch

The Making of Sgt. Pepper
Season 16 ( 1992-10-04)
Billy Connolly
Alice Walker
Peter O'Toole
Two Royal Ballet Dancers (Darcey Bussell, Viviana Durante)
Robert Zemeckis
George Formby
Sir Richard Attenborough
The Secret Life of Sir Arnold Bax
The World of Jeff Koons
Jimi Hendrix
Dracula
Monserrat Caballe
Annie Leibowitz
Guggenheim Museum
Dmitri and Sasha Sitkovetsky
Jean Genet
I, Berlioz
Richard Price
John Banville
Henryk Gorecki's 3rd symphony
Dudley Moore
Frink, 1930-1993 (Dame Elisabeth Frink)
Benny Goodman, the King of Swing
Paul Simon
Norman Wisdom
Season 17 ( 1993-09-12)
Sydney Pollack
Willy Russell
Ken Loach
Margaret Atwood
John Lee Hooker
Stevie Wonder
Sylvie Guillem
Tim Rice
Lynda La Plante
John Williams
John Lloyd's A-Z of Comedy (1)
John Lloyd's A-Z of Comedy (2)
Cliff Richard
Bheki Mseleku
Darker Than Me
Jean-Claude Carriere
Danny Kaye: Nobody's Fool
Looking for the Perfect Beat: Rap
Larry Adler Plays Gershwin
Kiri's 50th Birthday Concert
Clive Barker
Dawn French
Christian Boltanski
Eric Newby
John Steinbeck
Season 18 ( 1994-09-18)
Kenneth Williams
Marilyn Horne
New Generation Poets
Vanessa Redgrave
David Mamet
The Shearing Touch (George Shearing)
Alan Ayckbourn
Frankenstein
Thora Hird
The Glory of Gershwin
P.J. O'Rourke
Lionel Bart
Carl Orff
Classic Widows
Jonathan Miller
Flags of the Fante Coast
Catherine Bailey, the Lady is a Tramp / Roger Ballen
Edward Albee
Jodie Foster
Martin Amis
Country Music
Miriam Makeba
Season 19 ( 1995-09-10)
Clint Eastwwod
Ackroyd's Blake
Tom Sharpe
kd lang
Pavarotti at 60
Jimmy Nail
Dame Judi Dench
Coronation Street
Dame Barbara Cartland
Jonathan Raban: Badlands / Wynton Marsalis
Elaine Page Special
Sting
Albert Finney
Marlene Dietrich
John Eliot Gardiner
Vermeer: Light, Love and Silence

Claes Oldenburg
Baaba Maal
Maxine Peake / Wynton Marsalis in New Orleans
Alan Ayckbourn Workshop
Season 20 ( 1996-09-15)
Victoria Wood
Sir John Mills
Michael Crawford
Norman Mailer on Picasso
Chanson
Michael Collins
Bryn Terfel
Howard Hodgkin
Jimmy McGovern
Bogart: Here's Looking at You, Kid
Maggi Hambling
The US and Us (1)
The US and Us (2)
Gilbert and George (1)
Gilbert and George (2)

Valery Gergiev
Paganini
David Helfgott
Paul Auster
Young Directors (Preya Lal, Alexander Kelly, Franca Cereghini, Chris Dooks)
Season 21 ( 1997-10-05)
Scarfe on Hercules
Michael Flatley: Lord of the Dance
Kay Mellor

Björk
Iain Banks

Matthew Bourne's Adventures in Motion Pictures
Steven Bochco
Simon Raven
Franco Zeffirelli
Saul Zaentz
Gillian Wearing / Gary Hume
Marks and Gran
Hail Bop: a Portrait of John Adams
Nigel Kennedy
Gary Oldman
Body Art
John Tavener
The Bee Gees
Will Self
Afro-Cuban Allstars
This is Not an Exit: the Fictional World of Bret Easton Ellis
Wayne Sleep
Season 22 ( 1998-11-08)
Ossie Clarke (1)
Ossie Clarke (2)
Lesley Garrett
Harold Pinter
Maxine Peake/Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo
Walter Mosley
Petula Clark
Warren Beatty
John Tomlinson
Javier du Frutos
UB40
Anish Kapoor
New South African Artists

Lucy Gannon
Tony Harrison
Dolly Parton
Season 23 ( 1999-09-26)
Paul Merton
Frank McCourt
Howard Jacobson
Jose Cura
James Galway
The Lion King (stage play based on the film)
Joan Collins
Blur
Yoko Ono
Cher
Countertenors
Bing Crosby
Shakespeare
Millennium Dome
Sam Mendes
Michael Douglas
Chuck Close
Emir Kusturica
Amis on Amis
(composing classical music) (1)
Simon Holt's Sunrise, Yellow Noise (2)
Season 24 ( 2000-10-01)
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Ben Elton
Santana
Joyce [Carol Oates] on Marilyn [Monroe]
Mark Morris Dance Group
George MacDonald Fraser
Courtney Pine
Ron Howard
Dame Gillian Weir
[Marlene] Dumas and [Jemima] Stehli
Mark Quinn
Tom Jones
Ken Russell
Shirin Neshat
Russell Watson
Amos Oz
Greta Garbo
Elvis Costello with Annie Sofie von Otter
Bill Bryson
Ian Rankin
Ian Bostridge
Edmund White
Steve Coogan
Ravi Shankar
Tracey Emin
Season 25 ( 2001-10-07)
High and Low Culture in the Age of Television

(highlights)
Rachel Whiteread
Norman Foster
Dr. John
Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
Ladies and Gentlemen, Miss Renée Fleming
The Sopranos
Leif Ove Andsnes
Why the Novel Matters
Meera Syal
Johnnie Ray
Mario Vargas Llosa
Fay Weldon
R.E.M.
Neil LaBute
Cinema of Fire (Iranian cinema)
Moby
Bernie Taupin
Season 26 ( 2002-10-13)
Mike Leigh
Akram Khan
Graham Vick: Beethoven in the Big Top
Craig David
Andrew Davies
Joan Rivers
Willie Nelson
James MacMillan
Irek Mukhamedov
Gerhard Richter
Hanif Kureishi
How to Get Rich: Felix Dennis

Philip Pullman
Caryl Phillips
Conor McPherson
Herbie Hancock
Caetano Veloso
Ang Lee
The Real George Orwell
Juan Diego Florez
Nick Cave
Albert Camus
Robert Harris Takes on Rome
Andrew Lloyd Webber, the Full Picture
Ewan McGregor
Season 27 ( 2003-10-19)
Germaine Greer
Daniel Barenboim and the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra
TV Stories (1)
TV Stories (2)
Jamie Cullum
The Wilson Twins
John Lennon's Jukebox

Jack Vettriano
The Dance Theatre of Harlem
Jeanette Winterson
Johnny Hallyday
Othello
Ian McKellen
Season 28 ( 2004-08-22)
Street Music Stories
Ronnie Wood
Willie Nelson
Malcolm Arnold (1)
Malcolm Arnold (2)
Robert Frank
Michael Frayn
The Darkness
Iggy Pop
Ruth Rendell
Howard Goodall
Pete 'n' Dud, The Lost Shows
Ian McEwan
Going Sane
Khaled and Rachid
Alina Cojocaru, Johan Kobborg
The Garden of Cosmic Speculation
John Boorman
Red Priest
National Theatre's production of Henry IV
The Secret Art of War
Paul Abbott
Eric Sykes
Season 29 ( 2005-08-07)
Margot Fonteyn (1)
Margot Fonteyn (2)
Sophie Calle
Karl Jenkins
Eric Sykes
Maxim Vengerov
Alan Bennett
Pablo Trapero, Lucrecia Martel, Daniel Burman
The Life and Times of Tristram Shandy (film)
Peter Hall (1)
Peter Hall (2)
Little Britain: A South Bank Show Special
Armando Iannucci
Season 30 ( 2006-02-12)
Armando Iannucci
Manga Mania
John Rutter
PD James
Dusty Springfield
Seu Jorge
Romeo and Juliet
George Michael: I'm Your Man
Peter Blake
Nick Park & Aardman Animations
Steve Reich
Season 31 ( 2006-09-10)
Bill Bryson
JG Ballard
Robbie Coltrane
Episode 4
Spamalot
Claire Tomalin on Thomas Hardy
Sue Townsend
Lorenzo Da Ponte
Peter Blake
Nick Park and Aardman Animations
Steve Reich
Grayson Perry
Damien Hirst - Addicted To Art
Damien Hirst
Victoria Wood: A South Bank Show Special
Isabel Allende
Shane Meadows
Jarvis Cocker: Running The World
Martin Sheen On Playing It Real
Marianne Faithfull: A Life In Song
Zaha Hadid
MacBeth
Ian McMillan, Bard Of Barnsley
Emma Kirkby, The Unsung Heroine
June Whitfield
Michael Sheen On Playing It Real
Joan Dision
Ken Follett
The Mersey Sound
The Last Laugh: John Bird and John Fortune
Season 32 ( 2007-11-25)
Annie Lennox
Eric Clapton
The Making Of Viva La Diva
The Nutcracker Story
Kevin Spacey
Tim Burton
David McVicar
Revolution 68
Season 33 ( 2008-05-04)
Liza Minnelli
The Damned United
Gore Vidal
Sarah Waters
Tasmin Little
Billy Joel
Season 34 ( 2008-09-21)
The Streets
The One Ronnie
Bond
Cildo Meireles
Sam Taylor-Wood
The Mariinsky Theatre
Season 35 ( 2009-01-28)
The South Bank Show Awards
Beyond the Footlights
The Tempest
Will Young
Messiah
William Goldman
Out Of Nigeria
Out Of Nigeria (2)
Peter Kosminsky
Season 36 ( 2009-09-13)
The Wagner Family
Coldplay
Andy Warhol
Disney and Pixar
Lee Hall
Nick Hornby
Elbow
Carol Ann Duffy
Royal Shakespeare Company
South Bank Show Awards 2009
Season 37 ( 2010-03-28)
Andrew Lloyd Webber
Billy Connolly Revisited
Ian McEwan Revisited
Ian McKellen
Stephen Sondheim
David Hockney
Judi Dench
Kiri Te Kanawa Revisited
Victoria Wood
The Final Cut
Season 38 ( 2012-05-28)
Nicholas Hytner
Pat Barker
Trevor Nelson and Dizzee Rascal
Carlos Acosta, Edward Watson and Tamara Rojo

