Audio Drama part 2

PowerPoint Presentation

The Golden Age of Radio: 1934 - 1950

Intimacy

Radio was intimate.

It was a member of your family.

It sat in your living room,

brought the world into your home,

and it told you stories.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt understood this, and used radio to talk directly, simply and quietly to each individual American.

Intimacy

His Fireside Chats helped calm a nation through both the Great Depression and World War II.12/29/1940Remember this voiceFDR - Fireside Chat - National Security 12-29-1940 https://youtu.be/EaQH2LsghZk (Listen to the first 2 minutes and 30 seconds)

2:30Intimacy

Imagination

Radio: The Theater of the Imagination

I like radio more than television.

The pictures are better.

Letter from America by Alistair Cooke History of conventions - 17 July 1992 http://tinyurl.com/h5zg2ah Imagination

Imagination

Stan Freberg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stan_Freberg In 1966, comedian, radio pioneer and advertising executive Stan Freberg, working for the Radio Advertising Bureau, aptly illustrated the power of radio to generate imagery in the imagination of the listener and thereby directly involve the listener a a co-creator.

Stretching the ImaginationStan Freberg and Sarah Vaughn, 1966Radio Advertising Bureau

2:00

Imagination

Listen https://soundcloud.com/enbowen/stretching-the-imagination

The serial nature of radio allowed for character to be developed through the course of a series, for comedy and drama to be based on personalities made familiar over time.

Jack Benny was one of the leading American entertainers of the 20th century, movie actor, stand-up performer, radio personality, and eventually television star.

His radio show was one of the most popular of the Golden Age of Radio.

In a precursor to what we would today call meta, on his radio show he played himself, a star with his own radio show. His supporting cast were the actors who worked with him on his show. His radio show was a radio show within a radio show.

Over the course of the series he establisheda clear persona.

Among his many character defects, he wasdepicted as unrelentingly cheap. And much of the humor of his show played off this trait.

Jack Benny https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Benny

The Jack Benny ShowMarch 28, 1948 Your Money or Your Life

The following clip illustrates the humor derived from Bennys established stinginess.

Benny and his cast would perform in a studio or on stage, standing behind stationary microphones. Notice how the use of simple sound effects suggest setting and movement.

13Benny Money or Life Edit PartB

The Jack Benny ShowMarch 28, 1948 Your Money or Your Life

1:56Listen http://tinyurl.com/hkzxpw5The Jack Benny Program Your Money of Your Life https://youtu.be/p_XkdmRkOL0

14Benny Money or Life Edit PartB

The Jack Benny ShowDecember 7, 1947 The Violin LessonMel Blanc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mel_Blanc Another character trait established for Benny involved his complete obliviousness to his own ineptitude as a violin player.

In the following clip, Jack takes a violin lesson. His teacher is played by Mel Blanc, man of a thousand voices, later known for his vocal portrayals of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, and many more. Among the many characters Blanc played for Benny, he was also the sound of Bennys stuttering jalopy.

The Jack Benny ShowDecember 7, 1947 The Violin Lesson5:00

Listen https://soundcloud.com/enbowen/benny-vault-edit-partaThe Jack Benny Album No. 2 https://youtu.be/PSXv5Qc8Row

The Jack Benny ShowDecember 7, 1947 The Violin LessonIn the second clip, not only is the humor derived from Bennys miserliness, but sound effects are used to suggest a setting unlikely to actually exist in the home the series has suggested as Bennys residence.

The Jack Benny ShowDecember 7, 1947 The Violin Lesson

4:09Imagination

Listen http://tinyurl.com/hkzxpw5The Jack Benny Album No. 2 https://youtu.be/PSXv5Qc8Row

Lights OutLights Out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lights_Out_(radio_show)Arch Oboler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arch_Oboler Imagination

The radio series Lights Out was an anthology horror program that made extensive use of description and suggestion to eerie effect. It was created by Wyllis Cooper and later written and run by playwright Arch Oboler.

Obolers The Chicken Heart is one of the series most famous episodes, largely due to a comedy routine about the broadcast recorded by Bill Cosby in 1966. The Dark is another episode remembered for its horrific imagery. Both episodes have been lost, but Oboler recreated them for a recording in 1962 titled Drop Dead.

19Lights-Out--The-Chicken-Heart

Lights Out The Chicken HeartMarch 10, 1937 (Recreated in 1962)Listen to https://youtu.be/G_OD_jUnYNM

7:38Imagination


Lights Out The Chicken HeartMarch 10, 1937 (Recreated in 1999)Or listen to https://youtu.be/bwgmmMYshJQ

7:21Imagination


Lights Out The DarkDecember 29, 1937 (Recreated in 1962)Listen to Lights Out - "The Dark" - Scary Story 4 https://youtu.be/HC2mNJcYtvw 8:10Imagination


Wonderfulness Chicken HeartBill Cosby, 1966

6:23

Imagination

Listen to https://youtu.be/3vPimtcK3-A

23Cosby Chicken Heart

Quiet PleaseImagination

Quiet Please https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiet,_PleaseWyllis Cooper https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyllis_CooperQuiet Please http://www.quietplease.org/ Quiet Please, also created by Wyllis Cooper, was another fantasy / horror anthology program. The shows announcer was Ernest Chappell.

Wyllis CooperErnest Chappell

24Fourble Board Edit PartA


In The Thing on the Fourble Board, sound and description create an almost unimaginable horror.

Notice that you, the listener, are a character in the story. You are a visitor to the narrators home.


The Thing on the Fourble BoardQuiet Please, August 9, 1948

2:57Imagination

Listen to http://tinyurl.com/jj2zea3 The Thing on the Fourble Board https://youtu.be/qEiHNihRMRI



Imagination

The narrator tells you that the fourble board is a small platform that runs around the outside of an oil derrick about half way up.

One night geologist Billy Grunewald thinks he hears someone on the fourble board. He and the narrator investigate and find a gold ring in a core sample from a mile underground thats over a million years old, and a mud-covered finger made of rock thats invisible when the mud is removed.

Later that night Grunewald is killed, his neck broken, the ring stolen. It is just the first unexplained death.

The derrick is closed.



5:28Imagination

Listen to http://tinyurl.com/zdezgpdThe Thing on the Fourble Board https://youtu.be/ilRbcBhD9_0

28Fourble Board Edit PartB


The Creepiest Radio Show Ever? http://tinyurl.com/jh6x2znNot only are you, the listener, a character in the story. You die at the end.


First Person Narrative

First Person Singular

Beginning in 1938, Orson Welles directed his acting company in weekly literary adaptations for CBS radio. He told all his stories from a first person perspective, harnessing the intimacy and directness of the medium. Beginning as First Person Singular, the show was soon retitled The Mercury Theatre on the Air, named for Welles theatrical company.

Mercury Theatre History http://www.mercurytheatre.info/history

First Person Singular The Mercury Theatre on the Air was a critical if not a ratings success. Welles was a master of radio as a dramatic medium. He conducted his programs from a podium, as if the show were a symphony, and his actors and technicians an orchestra. He used the medium with as no one before or since.

The Mercury Theatre on the Air https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mercury_Theatre_on_the_Air

Treasure Island The Mercury Theatre on the Air, July 18, 1938

6:50Listen to http://tinyurl.com/he6hwt2 Treasure Island Mercury Theatre https://youtu.be/56jKvwtJJq0 Welles command of pacing, his unusual use of silence, and the sounds of a tapping cane and distant whistling added suspense to Robert Louis Stevensons classic tale of pirates.

Treasure Island Edit_1-2

Dracula The Mercury Theatre on the Air, July 30, 1938

For his adaptation of Bram Stokers epistolary novel, Welles was able to tell the story from several first person perspectives, just as Stoker had. From the CBS studio in New York, he staged in sound a great chase through the wilderness of Transylvania.

6:50Listen to http://tinyurl.com/gm5wn4f Dracula Mercury Theatre https://youtu.be/SK4frrg7SyU

Dracula Edit Climax

Education

Audio Drama part 2