How to Write a Radio Script

Video Transcript

"Hi, this is Laura Turner, and today we're going to talk about how to write a radio script. Writing a radio script is a lot different from writing a play or a screenplay because you actually, of course, have no actors for the people to see. So you're going to have to be very careful about how you phrase your dialog. And in fact, the writing in a radio script is even more important in some ways than the writing in a play or a screenplay because the audience has nothing to look at, so therefore they're going to be listening to your words a lot more tentatively. So just a couple of things to think about whenever you're writing your radio scripts: think about the actions that you are putting into your stage directions. "He jumps around wildly." Of course that's not going to be able to happen, so how do you get around that? Actually, put your actions into the mouths of other characters. "Don't jump like that!" or "Don't jump around like that! What are you doing?" Have your characters actually act out what's going on on the stage, if you would. Also, you won't be able to get any reactions from other characters, so if you're thinking about someone looks a certain way at another character, you can't get that in a radio play, so you might want to say, "Did you see her face?" or something along those lines to help you along. Also, think about using sound in your radio play. Think about how to get the most mileage out of using sound and sound cues in your play. Also, think about the fact that you don't have to have different actors playing different characters. If you have lots of characters and you want to use the same actor for a couple different characters, all they have to do is change their voice. So also get the most mileage out of the actors that you have to work with, but also think about when you write your characters for a radio play, make sure that they sound distinct and different from one another. This doesn't mean they all have to have different accents, but it does mean that they should all speak in a very specific way, that you should make sure that they are all very well differentiated, because the only way that your audience member is going to be able to differentiate them is through their voice. Okay? So good luck with that, and that's some tips for writing a radio script."