■ Condemned to death in the spring, Saturday Review is now reprieved thanks to listener power. In April, Radio 4’s controller, Gwyneth Williams, announced that the arts criticism programme would end in September. The reason given was cost. What? Yes, the sums (joke!) paid to a presenter, usually the excellent Tom Sutcliffe, and three guest critics, who discuss a play, film, book or the like, were too high. I suspect the money was a smokescreen. The real reason for closing the show, I believe, is that BBC radio and TV nowadays prefer arts programmes that are celebratory or promotional.
Take Radio 4’s Front Row, which goes out Mondays to Fridays at 7.15pm. It is very informative, and has fine presenters and good interviewees, but these days it rarely reviews or advises listeners on what is worth attending or avoiding. BBC arts coverage has moved away from criticism, whereas newspapers still have reviewers who do not pull their punches. Yet years ago we had Critics’ Forum on Radio 3, Late Night Line-up on BBC2 and, more recently, The Review Show on BBC2, then BBC4. All gone in the name of caution and that easier option of plugging.
■ Our groovy digital and culture minister, Matt Hancock, is right behind grime music, made famous by the likes of Dizzee Rascal, Skepta and Stormzy. In March, he wrote to the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, complaining that some grime artists were being stopped from performing because of a police risk-assessment form, 696, that clubs must fill in, giving all the personal details of the musicians. It has led on occasion to the cops preventing some from playing if they believe there could be a public danger. Some claim, though, that the form has been used more to discriminate against black artists.
Hancock recently got in touch with Khan again. It’s good, of course, that he wants to keep London’s music scene diverse, but was his interest in grime encouraged by Jonathan Badyal, his special adviser until the end of July, who is, frankly, grime-obsessed? Anyway, the splendid Badyal is becoming head of communications at Universal Music, the perfect job for him.
■ Just opened at the Bowes Museum, in Barnard Castle, Co Durham, is the punningly named Turkish Tulips exhibition, curated by Gavin Turk (geddit?), of work by artists including Damien Hirst, Cornelia Parker and Peter Blake inspired by the flower. It was timed in part to coincide with the opening of the movie Tulip Fever, due out this month after several delays. Based on Deborah Moggach’s book, it stars Alicia Vikander, Judi Dench and Jack O’Connell, and was shot three years ago, but has still not been released. With a bit of luck, it might be in cinemas before Turkish Tulips closes in November.