The legacy of the BBC’s long running arts strand is unrivalled, with Martin Scorsese once noting that ‘Arena is home to some of the greatest non-fiction film making in the past nearly 40 years’.
Since its launch in 1975, Arena has redefined arts broadcasting with its intelligent, often radical and poetic approach to storytelling. With over 600 films spanning the cultural spectrum including giants of the genre Bob Dylan: No Direction Home, Rudies Come Back: The Rise and Rise of 2 Tone, Paris is Burning and African Apocalypse, as well profiling icons from Orson Welles, Mel Brooks and Louise Bourgeois, to Amy Winehouse, Nelson Mandela and Caroline Aherne.
Voted into their List of Gamechangers in the History of BBC Television, the BFI are hosting a screening of My Way and The Chelsea Hotel, two of Arena’s most beloved films on 1 October at the National Film Theatre. The event will be dedicated to Alan Yentob and Arena mainstay film editor, the late Guy Crossman.
There will also be a 50th anniversary season of Arena classics on BBC Four this Autumn, introduced by Anthony Wall, with a further 50 titles from the archive available on BBC iPlayer.
Mark Bell, Commissioning Editor, BBC Arts said: “I am so proud to have had a hand on the tiller of Arena – it is the programme that opened my teenage eyes to authored documentary filmmaking and is widely regarded as the world’s greatest creative documentary strand. It has championed art and culture in its myriad manifestations for half a century and has been home to many outstanding directors.”
The Beatle and The Bass (w/t)
For over 50 years, the disappearance of Paul McCartney’s original Höfner bass guitar has been one of rock ‘n’ roll’s most enduring mysteries. The Beatle and The Bass (w/t) tells the extraordinary story of this iconic instrument, and the fan-powered quest to find it.
Paul McCartney said: “I think anything that’s nicked, you want back, especially if it has sentimental value. It just went off into the universe and it left us thinking, where did it go? There must be an answer.”
The film is a rock ‘n’ roll detective story featuring new interviews with Paul McCartney and many others who are personally connected to the bass. From Paul’s brother Mike McCartney, friend and artist Klaus Voormann, and roadies and collaborators such as Elvis Costello, to the fans, experts and journalists behind The Lost Bass Project, their memories are by turns funny, moving and surprising that help tell a compelling story about fandom, creativity, love, loss, memory and the transformative power of music.
The Beatle and the Bass (w/t) is a Passion Pictures Production in association with Footprint Media Partnership. The director is Arthur Cary. Editor is Paul Carlin and producer is Katherine Anstey. The Executive Producers are Emily Jeal and Hamish Fergusson. Associate Producers are Scott Jones and Naomi Jones. It was commissioned for BBC Arts by Mark Bell and Suzy Klein.
Turner: The Secret Sketchbooks
This groundbreaking documentary unlocks the hidden psychology of J.M.W. Turner through his 37,000 private sketches, drawings, and watercolours – an extraordinary archive that reveals the man behind the masterpieces. For the first time on television, these pages – Including erotic sketches previously thought to have been destroyed – are used as a window into Turner’s inner world, exposing his private thoughts, creative obsessions and emotional life. Rarely writing about himself, Turner left behind few clues to his personality. But in his sketchbooks, his restless imagination and vulnerabilities come vividly to life.
Helping unlock Turner’s life story is legendary actor Timothy Spall, who famously portrayed the artist in Mike Leigh’s Mr Turner. He is joined by Britain’s most renown living artist Tracey Emin, artist and filmmaker Sir John Akomfrah, Rolling Stone’s Ronnie Wood, psychotherapist Orna Guralnik, naturalist Chris Packham, and an array of leading art historians. Together, they guide viewers through Turner’s life and art, revealing how his 37,000 sketches not only chart his creative evolution but also provide an unprecedented psychological portrait of a man both visionary and vulnerable.
Turner: The Secret Sketchbooks is a Passion Pictures Production for BBC Arts. The Director is Rosie Schellenberg and Producer is Rosy Rickett. The Executive Producers are Kari Lia and Hamish Fergusson. It was commissioned for BBC Arts by Mark Bell and Suzy Klein.
Lowry: The Lost Tapes
50 years after L.S. Lowry’s death, this landmark documentary will bring to light a newly discovered treasure trove of unheard audio tapes recorded with the artist during the final four years of his life.
From the comfort of his own living room and inner sanctuary, we’ll hear from Lowry himself, his real voice lip-synced by one of our greatest actors. Taking us from the beginning of his life to the very end, he will reveal the formative memories and experiences that shaped him as an artist, and as a person.
This immersive documentary will foreground the touching, charming exchange between the enigmatic Lowry and his often surprising interviewer, a young researcher called Angela. But Lowry’s personal narrative also tells a bigger story, of a seismically changing Greater Manchester, where he lived, worked and painted so prolifically.
The film has been commissioned by the BBC from Wall to Wall Media to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of L.S. Lowry in 2026. It is commissioned by Suzy Klein and Mark Bell, the Executive Producer is Morgana Pugh, the Director is Peter Sweasey and the Producer is Hannah Mirsky.
About Arena
Launched as a magazine programme in 1975, Arena became a platform for single films when Alan Yentob took over as Series Editor in 1978. Nigel Finch and Anthony Wall were core directors, Wall recalls, “Under Alan’s visionary leadership, Nigel and I were able to film a different kind of subject for an Arts strand – My Way, The Ford Cortina, Desert Island Discs and The Chelsea Hotel. The films were playful but serious, we had no rules. Together the three of us forged a distinctive Arena style that has underpinned the decades that followed.” Taking over from Yentob in 1985, Finch and Wall edited the series till Finch’s untimely death in 1995 and Wall continued till 2018.