Radio Drama brings together the practical skills needed for radio drams, such as directing, writing and sound design, with media history and communication theory. Challenging the belief that sound drama is a 'blind medium', Radio Drama shows how experimentation in radio narrative has blurred the dividing line between fiction and reality in modern media. Using extracts from scripts and analysing radio broadcasts from America, Britain, Canada and Australia, the book explores the practicalities of producing drama for radio. Tim Crook illustrates how far radio drama has developed since the first 'audiophonic production' and evaluates the future of radio drama in the age of live phone-ins and immedate access to programmes on the Internet.

For generations, fans and critics have characterized classic American radio drama as a “theater of the mind.” This book unpacks that characterization by recasting the radio play as an aesthetic object within its unique historical context. In Theater of the Mind, Neil Verma applies an array of critical methods to more than six thousand recordings to produce a vivid new account of radio drama from the Depression to the Cold War. In this sweeping exploration of dramatic conventions, Verma investigates legendary dramas by the likes of Norman Corwin, Lucille Fletcher, and Wyllis Cooper on key programs ranging from The Columbia Workshop, The Mercury Theater on the Air, and Cavalcade of America to Lights Out!, Suspense, and Dragnet to reveal how these programs promoted and evolved a series of models of the imagination. With close readings of individual sound effects and charts of broad trends among formats, Verma not only gives us a new account of the most flourishing form of genre fiction in the mid-twentieth century but also presents a powerful case for the central place of the aesthetics of sound in the history of modern experience.

An essential guide for anyone who dreams of penning tomorrow's radio classics.

'Tim Crook has written an important and much-needed book, and its arrival on our shelves has come at a highly appropriate time.' Professor Seán Street, Bournemouth University The Sound Handbook maps theoretical and practical connections between the creation and study of sound across the multi-media spectrum of film, radio, music, sound art, websites, animation and computer games entertainment, and stage theatre. Using an interdisciplinary approach Tim Crook explores the technologies, philosophies and cultural issues involved in making and experiencing sound, investigating soundscape debates and providing both intellectual and creative production information. The book covers the history, theory and practice of sound and includes practical production projects and a glossary of key terms. The Sound Handbook is supported by a companion website, signposted throughout the book, with further practical and theoretical resources dedicated to bridging the creation and study of sound across professional platforms and academic disciplines.

"One of the few books we'd recommend" BBC Training "The perfect guide for anyone who wants to get on in this ever-changing and challenging media" Controller BBC Radio 5 Live "A rich repository of real, practical experience" Director - BBC Nations & Regions "An invaluable guide" Director - The Radio Academy This is a practical, how-to guide to producing and presenting radio to a professional standard. Packed with day-to-day advice that captures the essence and buzz of live broadcasting; from preparing your show before it goes out, last minute changes to running orders, deciding what to drop in over a track, how to sell a feature or promote a programme, setting up competitions, thinking fast in a phone in - this book will help you do all that and more. It covers network and commercial, music and talk radio skills and is particularly suited to the independent local or community radio. It features advice from professionals, covers industry-wide best practice with enough 'need-to-know' technical information to get you up and running. This edition has been updated throughout and has more than 500 weblinks to downloads and audio and video examples, as well as cross-references to the official National Occupational Standards for Radio Content.

Almost every evening for nine years during the late 1970s and early 1980s, the CBS Radio Mystery Theatre brought monsters, murderers and mayhem together for an hour. Created, produced and directed by Himan Brown, the series remains a landmark in radio drama. This book is a detailed history and episode guide to the show. Descriptive information includes exact titles, airdates and rebroadcast dates, episode numbers, cast lists, writer and adapter credits, and a storyline synopsis. This material comes directly from CBS press releases in order to insure complete accuracy. Also included wherever possible are information about the actors and actresses, quotes from performers and writers (many from personal interviews), anecdotes about various scripts and sound effects, and other notes of interest.

This collection of forty new essays, written by the leading scholars in adaptation studies and distinguished contributors from outside the field, is the most comprehensive volume on adaptation ever published. Written to appeal alike to specialists in adaptation, scholars in allied fields, and general readers, it hearkens back to the foundations of adaptation studies a century and more ago, surveys its ferment of activity over the past twenty years, and looks forward to the future. It considers the very different problems in adapting the classics, from the Bible to Frankenstein to Philip Roth, and the commons, from online mashups and remixes to adult movies. It surveys a dizzying range of adaptations around the world, from Latin American telenovelas to Czech cinema, from Hong Kong comics to Classics Illustrated, from Bollywood to zombies, and explores the ways media as different as radio, opera, popular song, and videogames have handled adaptation. Going still further, it examines the relations between adaptation and such intertextual practices as translation, illustration, prequels, sequels, remakes, intermediality, and transmediality. The volume's contributors consider the similarities and differences between adaptation and history, adaptation and performance, adaptation and revision, and textual and biological adaptation, casting an appreciative but critical eye on the theory and practice of adaptation scholars--and, occasionally, each other. The Oxford Handbook of Adaptation Studies offers specific suggestions for how to read, teach, create, and write about adaptations in order to prepare for a world in which adaptation, already ubiquitous, is likely to become ever more important.

Throughout the world, the media is used in various ways to promote social awareness and initiate social development. Of all the available means of communication, radio is still the one with the maximum reach in most developing countries. This book, the first in a three-book series titled Communication for Behavior Change, offers extremely practical guidance on how to design, write, and produce radio dramas aimed at motivating social change. Written by a leading teacher and practitioner of Entertainment–Education, it is the only available book which provides complete and hands-on instructions for creating successful radio serial dramas for behavior change. The text is interspersed with examples which show how entertainment and education have been woven together to create awareness programs that are both popular and effective. Extracts from several successful scripts from many countries are also provided to demonstrate what has previously clicked with the audience.

This volume explores the history of American drama from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. It describes origins of early republican drama and its evolution during the pre-war and post-war periods. It traces the emergence of different types of American drama including protest plays, reform drama, political drama, experimental drama, urban plays, feminist drama and realist plays. This volume also analyzes the works of some of the most notable American playwrights including Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams, and Arthur Miller and those written by women dramatists.