Part-time punk turned professional provocateur - columnist Rod Liddle

Rod Liddle was a columnist and broadcaster who strongly divided opinion. Some saw him as an entertaining satirist, others, a bigot. As a teenager he joined a punk band and studied social psychology at the London School of Economics. He was politically active too, first as a member of Socialist Workers Party and then a Labour speech writer. He later joined the BBC as a trainee producer, working his way up to become editor of the Today programme. His former boss, Roger Mosey, told us how he immediately stood out from the crowd.

Vicki Wickham was one of the music industry’s most influential managers with clients including Marc Almond, Morrissey, and Dusty Springfield. She landed the job of booking acts for ITV's Ready Steady Go! despite knowing little about music and became the driving force behind the show, arranging appearances by the likes of Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles. Vicki’s friend Simon Napier Bell, who himself managed artists like Wham!, Marc Bolan and Ultravox, recalls the lasting impact she had on the industry.

Simone Forti was the pioneering dancer and choreographer whose pieces often use improvisation and draw on inspiration from the world around her using everyday objects like rope and wood alongside the human body. Simone’s start in life was challenging. Her Jewish family had to flee from the increasing threat of the Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini. Her biographer Ann Cooper Albright shares her story.

Justin Hardy was a Bafta and Emmy-nominated director known for historical films. His father was Robin Hardy the director of cult classic The Wicker Man. Robin had eight children by five different women and the making of the tortured film tore Justin's family apart. Justin went onto make a documentary with his half-brother Dominic Hardy, Children of the Wicker Man, where they interrogated their childhood using newly discovered documents from his father. Justin also completed his father's Wicker Man trilogy with new film Wrath of the God's - the release of which he never saw.

Presenter: Matthew Bannister Producer: Ben Mitchell Assistant producer: Catherine Powell Researcher: Jesse Edwards Editor: Andrea Kennedy

Archive: Channel 4 News, 19/06/2014, YouTube; BBC Two, Have I Got News For You, 19/10/2002; BBC Radio 4, Start the Week, 02/06/2014; LA Women, EZTV, Kate Crash, 15/10/2012, YouTube; Huddle, Friends of the High Line, 12/11/2013, YouTube; Simone Forti, Slant Board, 1961. © 2026 The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Audio courtesy of MOCA - The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Performed January 29, 2023, during the exhibition Simone Forti (presented at MOCA Grand Avenue, January 15 – April 3, 2023); BBC World Service, Outlook, 09/04/2024