Radio plays performed for a live studio audience are an old concept enjoying a new wave.
Theatre NorthWest is currently in rehearsals for their upcoming rendition of It's A Wonderful Life done in that value-added theatrical style of an audience looking in on actors doing a show for radio, but being a compelling visual performance of its own.
First, though, to give local viewers an appetizer, community group Pocket Theatre is doing a reading of Dracula: The Radio Play. This is the same script that was actually done on-air in 1938 by a cast of up-and-coming performers led by a young Orson Welles.
"It was the first one that Orson Welles and Mercury Theatre Company did," said Pocket Theatre's director/producer Allison Haley. "They used the actors from their conventional theatre group to do the radio plays. They injected a little sexual innuendo, a little danger, really edgy stuff for radio at the time - a bit more theatre to it. It was groundbreaking stuff for the era, and then of course they did War Of The Worlds."
That radio play scared the proverbial pants off America, giving no uncertain proof as to how powerful radio drama could really be.
Dracula is, of course, one of the most enduring stories of the Gothic genre, loaded in dark and sinister drama thanks to the expert writing of novelist Bram Stoker. The radio play was a direct adaptation of his classic vampire story.
"This version of Dracula is just as spine-tingling today as it was then," Halley said.
As was the way in the golden age of radio, Pocket Theatre has assembled a small and dexterous cast of actors to carry out many roles. Halley is working with eight thespians plus one foley artist (the creator of the live sound effects). That critical role falls to Katherine Benny while the voices will be those of Stephen St. Laurent, Mark Wheeler, Tina Burridge, Lynne Brown, Jessica Brown, Peter Maides, Andrea Mallett and the surprise return of veteran local actor Bas Rynsewyn to the stage after a prolonged absence.
"I think he's been kind of secretly wanting to come back, but doesn't have a lot of time. But I saw him in a grocery store and I pounced on him," said Halley, a longtime friend.
It was easier for Rynsewyn to say yes to this sort of performance because it only requires a week or so of rehearsals, plus the two performances.
"It's challenging for the actors because they are used to performing with the whole instrument, but for this it is all channeled into the voice," Haley said. "You don't have to memorize the lines, but you do have to present them with the right characterization, and you do have to understand how your character relates to the story and the other characters. So it is easier in some ways but more challenging in other ways."
Dracula: The Radio Play happens Monday and Tuesday each show at 7:30 p.m. in the Stan Shaffer Theatre at CNC (Room 1-306). The whole theatrical affair will have a literal line to the radio, though. UNBC's campus station CFUR-88.7 will be recording the performance for later broadcast and archival posterity.
Admission is by donation with all proceeds going to Pocket Theatre's cause of choice for this event, the funding of local athlete Meryeta O'Dine as she strives to make the Canadian Olympic team in the sport of snowboard racing.
Haley urged the public to come take part, and also pencil Theatre NorthWest's upcoming production into your calendar.
"We are all excited to go see It's A Wonderful Life and see this kind of thing done on the big stage," Haley said. "They do so much for local theatre, and I know this show is going to be a lot of fun to watch, and they have some local talent in the cast, too, so it just goes to show you what can happen when you have a strong theatre community. You can be in a show like ours and you can work towards being in a professional production like theirs."
