Title: It might work like that ...
Course: Hörspielwerkstatt / Radio Plays

It might work like that ...

As you learned before, a script and a story are completely different from one another.

Let's see how descriptions from a story could be included in the script for a radio play. Have a look at the colours to find out which parts of the script refer to certain lines in the story.

Example of a story

When Tara received the letter, she began to cry. Her best friend hated her and she didn’t understand why. She decided to call Karly.

The phone rang at Karly’s house. "Hello, Karly speaking," Karly answered the phone. "Hello, this is Tara," Tara replied not knowing what to expect.

(Excerpt from True Friends by Shanna Michael)

Example of a script for a radio play

(sound effect: crying girl)

TARA (sobbing): Why does she hate me? Why, oh why?

(sound effect: dialling a number on the phone, then ringing telephone)

KARLY (friendly): Hello, Karly speaking!

TARA (unsure what to expect): Hello, this is Tara ...

You can see that the descriptions from the story are still there in the audio script, but they have been turned into sentences, into distinctive ways of speaking or sound effects. Therefore we can perceive them while listening to the radio play. There are not necessarily all descriptions in the script, but at least the most important.

Clue #3 Try to finish your script before you continue with the production process. Include all the dialogues, also all the sound effects and pieces of music you want to use in your radio play. Then you can look for these audio files more efficiently afterwards.