Front Row: Archive 2014

Disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong is the subject of Oscar-winning documentary-maker Alex Gibney's latest film, The Armstrong Lie. In 2009 the film-maker, whose previous documentaries include Taxi to the Dark Side and Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, set out to make a film about Armstrong's comeback year after a four-year retirement from the sport, but found himself with a bigger story in the wake of his doping confession on Oprah. Michael Carlson reviews. Juliet Stevenson stars as Winnie in Samuel Beckett's play of resilience and self-reliance, Happy Days, at the Young Vic. Juliet tells Kirsty about her reservations in playing this major role, seen by some as the female Hamlet, and about the challenges of acting when submerged from the neck up. In American writer Willy Vlautin's new novel The Free, a young member of the National Guard is returned home after suffering serious brain injury as a result of a roadside bomb in Iraq. The Free charts his slow recovery and the struggles he faces in a country wh