The Stage

Going Live - How to get started in radio acting (Part Two)

Published Monday 5 September 2005 at 13:05 by Marina Caldarone

In the second part of our guide to getting started in radio acting, Marina Caldarone suggests how best to approach the independent production companies who supply drama programmes

As an actor, particularly if you have not worked in radio drama, you might think that all of the output you hear on Radio 4 and Radio 3 is made by the BBC.

Actually, the independent radio drama production companies make a percentage. This percentage adjusts slightly every year but currently stands at 10%. Yes, all of the work is transmitted by the BBC and is commissioned by its commissioning editors but that 10% is produced from a pool of about 70 independent production companies which are BBC-approved.

There are actually many hundreds more indies. These may be making work for the commercial sector, for talking books, CD Roms, public information services or commentaries for museums and galleries. But radio drama is a burgeoning field and it would be well worth finding out a bit about those BBC-approved suppliers.

When you listen to a radio play or look at the Radio Times, the company who makes the programme - if this is not the BBC - will be credited in some way. The most efficient way of finding out about that company is to investigate online. Their websites will generally tell you everything you need to know about them, including how much of their output is drama and how to approach them if you want to acquaint them with your work.

Talking of which, I asked John Taylor of the Fiction Factory, Marilyn Imrie of Catherine Bailey Productions, Clive Brill of Pacificus and Peter Hoare of Pier Productions - all representing well established companies with terrific reputations in radio drama - to provide a consensus of indie opinion on this. They gave a number of suggestions.

Firstly, there were lots of mentions of wanting to find new talent but having little time to do so. Therefore let them know when you can be heard or seen in something, in whatever medium. Pacificus’ Brill explained: “I most enjoy going to the theatre and seeing great acting, so I am happy to be harangued into going to see an actor if they consider themselves to be giving a great performance. I cast in this way more than any other.”

The second piece of advice was to make contact with production companies in your area. For example Pier Productions in Brighton are building a locally based actors’ database. A third recommendation was to send in a voiceover CD but either leave off the non-dramatic work or refer the listener specifically to dramatic and narrative tracks.

At most of the companies, the directors are employed on a mostly freelance basis, ie they may well work within other organisations and they certainly, albeit informally, share casting information with other directors within that company and without it. It saves them time and makes them feel confident that they will not be let down by disappointing performances. It makes sense to do the best job you can, as it might lead to another casting with a director you don’t know other than who knows you by recommendation.

Interestingly none mentions using the voice clip facility at Spotlight. Maybe that is because three separate 30-second clips - which is what Spotlight recommends - aren’t quite long enough to get the full feel of the voice. In fact Spotlight does allow you up to two minutes total time and I would suggest it is better to offer two longer clips if you are pushing your dramatic skills. I know that actors are put off by having to clear all the copyright issues around using the clip. Hopefully it will evolve into a simpler and more user-friendly system soon, as it is a great idea in theory.

There is certainly an imperative felt by the indies to bring in new voices to the medium but it is riskier on the directors’ part in radio, a form in which it is unusual to have rehearsal time. This does vary, however, between companies. Catherine Bailey productions have rehearsals away from the studio where the writer and director have time and space to further develop the script in response to the actors’ interpretation.

There needs to be a technical confidence within the playing, so experience counts for a lot. But everyone has to get his or her first job. If you have the support of a confident director, who has heard you in another medium, that first part can lead to much more. An added challenge is that radio acting is both aided and compromised by the fact that actors don’t have to learn the words. This can make for generalised work that can depend on the externals of vocal technique.

The strong radio actor resists this, particularly if called in to read a part as audition, and is totally truthful with a ‘warts and all’ realness, vocally as well as emotionally. One doesn’t have to have the ‘voice beautiful’. Actors can think, mistakenly, that there is a certain style of playing in radio that requires a certain kind of voice. This might have been the case 40 years ago but is far from so these days.

As the Fiction Factory’s Taylor points out, there is greater diversity in radio productions than there has ever been before. “The thing about radio drama is its huge range of styles and genres - from soaps to Sophocles. The acting style has to be appropriately pitched. I suppose there is a more general trend towards a more naturalistic approach, as there has been in all media.”

Brill doesn’t believe that nowadays there is a different approach to acting but rather a broader variety of styles than there used to be. “I don’t think there is a new trend. Radio drama requires a huge range of talent from what might be considered classic serial acting to very realistic, natural cinema verite styles. Our challenge is to keep trying different styles of acting in different slots. I am a little tired of hearing RP voices whenever there is a ‘classic’ on.”

Above all, actors should embrace the dramatic scope available in radio performance. As Hoare explains: “One of the great joys of working in radio drama is to enjoy the work done by a host of different directors all of whom naturally have different styles.

“The magic happens in the relationship between the actors and the director in the studio.”

• Marina Caldarone is co-compiler, with Marilyn Le Conte, of Radio-active, to be published by Methuen later this year - duologues and monologue collections specifically for radio, TV and film