In a post on the SFWA blog, Katie Gill offers advice for writing radio drama. “In recent years, audio drama has made a comeback in the form of narrative podcasts, which have gone from relative niche to mainstream markets,” she says. “Likewise, the pandemic-era growth in remote recording has given more people the confidence and resources to record a podcast out of their bedrooms.”
If you want to try your hand at audio drama, Gill suggests a few tips:
- Jump into the form. Just as writers need to read widely, script writers should listen to as much audio drama as possible and read scripts. “The more audio drama you listen to, both within and beyond your intended genre, the easier it will be for you to pick out what works for you and what doesn’t,” she says. “Reading while you listen (and just reading scripts in general) can help you see what changed from script to post-production and all the ways the text might be interpreted.”
- Don’t focus too much on visual plot points. “Certain jokes, gags, and character designs might not work when limited to an audio medium,” Gill writes. Avoid the need to stop your narrative to describe a visual element the audience needs to understand.
- Take advantage of the audience’s imagination. In contrast, do rely on your audience’s ability to visualize your story. “Visual media projects without big studio money might find it hard to create a convincingly apocalyptic hellscape or robotic invasion from a different dimension, but with audio dramas, if you have good acting and a few well-placed sound effects, listeners’ minds will fill in the gap,” Gill notes.
- Speech quality above all else. “When casting your audio drama, pick someone with a clear voice and good diction,” Gill advises. “They might be the best actor in the world, but if you can’t understand them, then they’re a poor fit for audio drama.”
- Keep your cast manageable. Especially when you start out, keep your cast list small. An audience may have a hard time distinguishing among actors in a large cast, because they don’t have visual reminders. As you gain experience, you can experiment with larger casts.
- Adapt to your medium. As with any medium, you can’t merely copy and paste from one form to another. What works in your short story or novel might not in an audio drama. “Tailor your script to the medium,” Gill says. “And if you want to adapt an existing text? Read the dialog aloud and revise accordingly.”
