There’s something wonderful and powerful about radio plays.
It’s a very intimate way to hear a story performed and I’m not sure whether it’s that intimacy or the creativity that comes with this medium that most appeals to me.
A tool of the radio trade (Photo by Soonios Pro via Pexels)
A friend got me into radio plays by introducing me to Paul Temple, a fictional 1950s crime writer and amateur sleuth. Along with his wife, he solves crimes all over London and across Europe. Since then I’ve listened to hundreds of hours of performance and am determined to write a radio play of my own.
I love the creativity of radio plays. As a writer of print or ebooks, you can spend pages describing a setting or a character, if you want to. As a creator of films, you can convey a thousand words in just a minute of screen time. Radio depends on the quality and accuracy of side effects and their ability to create the right pictures in the listener’s head. That’s where the magic happens. In the Charles Paris radio series, we follow Bill Nighy as the main character rushes home from a rehearsal and gets knocked off his bike by a Dachshund. Even though you can’t see it happen, the sound effects make for a hilarious scene, which your imagination can create.
It never fails to amaze me how quickly you can be drawn into a world that is created accurately without being able to see anything. I’m sure, as well, that everyone who listens to the play will see things slightly differently.
It’s very flexible, meaning that you can move settings very quickly and with no expense. Your characters can travel anywhere in the world – or outside it – without even leaving the recording studio. For example, Paul Temple and his wife travel to Germany for one case. In Six Degrees of Assassination by MJ Arlidge, officers from the intelligence services can rush around London, we can join the Prime Minister in the House of Commons Chamber and be at a hospital when a woman says goodbye to her fatally injured husband. That particular scene was one which brought a tear to my eye, both from the sounds and the emotion conveyed by the actor. Without being able to see her, I could imagine tears sliding down her face. Such is the power of the audio performance.
Audio is a very versatile medium. You can listen to it anywhere. Radio plays often accompany me out running, while cooking in the kitchen or when commuting to work. This makes it very accessible.
There is a certain type of skill required in writing a piece for audio performance. You need to be able to tell the story and describe the characters movements without the audience being able to see it. Your characters must sometimes describe what they can see or what moves they’re doing without the dialogue sounding stilted and it being obvious what you’re doing.
Audio in general is becoming more popular, with figures released by Deloitte suggesting that audio books are likely to overtake e-book sales, bringing £115 million to the market.
I, for one, hope that more authors develop the skill to create radio drama and keep this great medium going. I know I’ll certainly be trying my hand at it.
In fact, check out the short monologue I wrote below:
A revving car engine as a car pulls away from the kerb.
Woman (giggling):
Whoops
High heels scrape as someone staggers up some concrete stairs. There is a sound of metal scratching
Woman (sounding frustrated):
Oh come on, please. Please. I need to get in. What is wrong with this— (more sounds of scratching metal)
Why do I always do this? I’m cold and I’m tired. Whoops.
Sound of keys dropping onto concrete
Woman (Sniggers):
I hope I don’t get caught. I shouldn’t be doing this.
A mobile phone makes a text message sound
Woman (giggling):
Shhhhh. Shhhhh. You’ll get me caught.
More metallic scraping
Woman (frustrated):
Why doesn’t this fit? Have they changed the locks? I know they’ve threatened it before but they wouldn’t, surely they wouldn’t.
Click of a lock and door swings open
Woman (sniggering drunkenly):
Oh, hi Mum.
Recommended reading:
I found this exercise in the Mslexia mini guide: Writing for radio: how to write a radio drama.