Radio drama Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
A radio drama or radio play is a play to listen to (i.e. with sound only), for radio broadcasting. They were especially popular before there was television. They were often live. A more recent version of radio drama are audio play which are now often made for CD distribution.Probably the two most famous radio dramas are Under Milk Wood, a 'Play for Voices' by Dylan Thomas, and (in the US) Orson Welles's version of The War of the Worlds, which convinced large numbers of listeners that an actual invasion from Mars was taking place..
Radio drama is still popular-much more popular than televisual plays. Partly this is because of the need for the audience to use its imagination in picturing scenes and characters. Many film, stage and TV writers got their start in radio drama, including Tom Stoppard and Caryl Churchill. Broadcasters that produce radio drama often require a large number of scripts, since they cannot be reused in the way that a stage play can. The relatively low cost of producing a radio play enables them to take a chance with works by unknown writers. Radio is a good training medium for drama writers as the words written form a much greater part of the finished product; bad lines cannot be obscured with 'stage business'.
The lack of visuals also enable fantastical settings and effects to be used in radio plays where the cost would be prohibitive in a visual medium. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was first produced as radio drama, and was not translated to television until much later, when its popularity would ensure an appropriate return for the high cost of the futuristic setting.
On occasions television series can be revived as radio series. For example a long-running but no longer popular television series can be continued as a radio series because the reduced production costs make it cost-effective with a much smaller audience. When an organisation owns both television and radio channels, such as the BBC, the fact that no royalties have to be paid makes this even more attractive. Radio revivals can also use actors reprising their television roles even after decades as they still sound roughly the same. Series that have had this treatment include Doctor Who, Dad's Army and Thunderbirds.
Radio plays often include the work of Shakespeare and other playwrights.
Radio dramas can be regularly heard on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio 1, and the British Broadcasting Corporation, Radio 4 and Radio 3. The networks sometime sell transcripts of their shows on cassette tapes or CDs or make the shows available for listening or downloading over the Internet.
Transcripts of many pre-television shows have been preserved. They are collected and traded by hobbyists today as old-time radio programs.
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