Content from BBC Arts

London: The Modern Babylon is legendary director Julien Temple's epic time-traveling voyage to the heart of his hometown.

The extraordinary life of playwright, singer, actor, composer, and director Noël Coward, who rose from poverty to stardom while keeping his sexuality a secret. Featuring Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Frank Sinatra, Michael Caine and Lucille Ball. Narrated by Alan Cumming. With Rupert Everett as the voice of Noël Coward. Directed by Academy Award Nominee Barnaby Thompson.

The 1916 Battle of the Somme remains the most famous battle of World War I, remembered for its bloodshed and its limited territorial gains. What is often overlooked, however, is the literary importance of the Somme: more writers and poets fought in it than in any other battle in history. Narrated by Michael Sheen, War of Words: Soldier-Poets of the Somme details the experiences of the poets and writers who served in the battle. The work of Siegfried Sassoon, Robert Graves, David Jones, Isaac Rosenberg and JRR Tolkien (who arrived at the Western Front with ambitions to be a poet) was informed and transformed by the battle. Taken together, their experiences allow us to see this dreadful historical event through multiple points of view. The film uses animation, documentary accounts, surviving artefacts, battalion war diaries and the landscape itself to reconnect this literature to the events that inspired it.

While touring to promote her second studio album "Sucker", Charli XCX tackles what feminism ('the f-word') really means to women in the music industry in a series of interviews with other pop artists.

Dream city, Sin City, a mirage in the desert, Las Vegas is a film set in its own right, a piece of pop art, an outdoor museum of American culture. What is the story behind the neon lights and fantastical buildings? What will its future be in these tough times? Alan Yentob takes a mob tour and talks to producers and performers about the golden days when Sinatra and Dino held the stage, and the wise guys called the shots.

A pioneering artist and cultural icon. His work is a history of 20th-century America. A country reinventing itself - as seen through the legendary artist's eyes.

The BBC Symphony Orchestra perform a live soundtrack in this premier stage adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes thriller.

The story of Gluck - Britain's cross-dressing high society painter of the 1930s - who staged 'one-man shows', had relationships with women and somehow got away with it.

As good as any Dickens novel, this is the triumphant and tragic story of the greatest architectural dynasty of the 19th century. Dan Cruickshank charts the rise of Sir George Gilbert Scott to the very heights of success, the fall of his son George Junior and the rise again of his grandson Giles. It is a story of architects bent on a mission to rebuild Britain. From the Romantic heights of the Midland Hotel at St Pancras station to the modern image of Bankside power station (now Tate Modern), this is the story of a family that shaped the Victorian age and left a giant legacy.

Writer Broadcaster and Newsnight arts correspondent Stephen Smith finds out what it took to get ahead at the court of Richard II.

Inspired by a powerful involuntary mania which took hold of citizens in the city of Strasbourg just over five hundred years ago, this film is a collaboration in isolation with some of the greatest dancers working today.

Featuring exclusive access to their recent tour and their new album, this documentary reveals the fascinating world of Pet Shop Boys, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe.

An ageing director is making her final film: one delving into her past. Face to face with the embodiment of her younger self, the line between her present reality and the film's blur.

Join art historian Robert Hughes for a fascinating journey into the life of Spanish painter Francisco Goya. Using the artist's works as the benchmarks in this biographical profile, Hughes follows Goya from his role as painter to the royal court through his maturity as a war reporter and into his troubled final years. Hughes reveals how the upheaval of Goya's life can be traced through his paintings that range from the fanciful to the insane.

In 1968, Jackie Collins published her first novel The World Is Full of Married Men to remarkable success and immediate scandal. Over the next decades, Collins would go on to build an empire writing books where female agency came first. Jackie Collins’ women were unapologetic about their needs and their sexual desire, and to her devoted readers, Collins became a symbol of the effortless power that defined her heroines.

The Ruins Of Empires is an innovative performance piece by Hip Hop Artist and writer Akala. It is an abridged version of his epic poem of the same name and is a personal interpretation of history as told through the 'knowledge seeker' performed by Akala himself. He follows the course of mans evolution, via astral travel and multiple reincarnations, in an attempt to discover the cause of the rise and fall of Empires. It is driven by a musical score by Mala and Paul Gladstone-Reid and combines innovative animation techniques and emerging technology with some of the most ground breaking creative talents in the industry, under the creative guidance of Andy Serkis and The Imaginarium.

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. 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.

Guilty-pleasure movies and the perceptions surrounding them.

Few musicals can claim to capture the mood of a historical period as well as the 1972 classic Cabaret. Liza Minnelli's unforgettable portrayal of singer Sally Bowles and the film's stylish recreation of the era have become defining images of Weimar Berlin. In this documentary, actor Alan Cumming explores the truths behind the fiction. He meets many of those closely involved with the original film, including Liza Minnelli, and talks to cabaret artists, among them acclaimed performer Ute Lemper. Alan explores the origins of the Cabaret story in the writings of Christopher Isherwood and uncovers the story of the real life Sally Bowles, a woman very different from her fictional counterpart. He talks to the composer of Cabaret about the inspiration for the film's most famous songs and discovers the stories of the original composers and performers, among them Marlene Dietrich. Finally, Alan reveals the tragic fate of many of the cabaret artists at the hands of the Nazis.

Art historian Dr James Fox makes the case for a singularly British renaissance, telling the stories of the artists and artisans who changed Britain forever.

Sadler’s Wells & BBC Arts present a three-part celebration of dance featuring many of the UK’s leading dance companies and the most exciting new emerging talent. Presented by Brenda Emmanus as part of BBC Arts’ Culture in Quarantine, this unique festival has been curated in lockdown by Sadler’s Wells, London - one of the world’s leading dance houses.

Alastair Sooke tells the story of Ancient Egyptian art through 30 extraordinary masterpieces.

Treasures of Ancient Rome is a 2012 three-part documentary written and presented by Alastair Sooke. The series was produced by the BBC, and originally aired in September 2012 on BBC Four. In the documentary Sooke sets out to "debunk the myth that Romans didn't do art and were unoriginal". This is based on the view that Romans heavily incorporated Greek style in their art, and hence produced nothing new or original. Sooke has received some criticism from the media owing to the fact that there is no consensus among academics on this topic, and hence no 'myth' exists in the first place.

Historian Sam Willis traces the story of Britain's castles and their unique role in our history, art and literature.

What you had to say, do and dress in order to get ahead at various times in history

Maritime historian Dr Sam Willis looks at how and why the shipwreck came to loom so large in British history.

Dr Sam Willis charts the history of the British outlaws.

From the Tower of London to Buckingham Palace, Dan Cruickshank tells the story of a thousand years of palace building, the mystery of why so many have vanished and the magic of the ones that survive.

Revealing anecdotes from some of Science Fiction's brightest stars give an entertaining insight into their best-known work.