BBC – Page 17 – SFFaudio

BBCR4: The Ditch

SFFaudio Online Audio

Radio Times - Afternoon Play: The Ditch The Radio Times, that invaluable resource for radio programmes airing in the UK, has a picked a “spine-tingling” tale for us to listen to. The Ditch is set to air on February 1st, 2010 in BBC Radio 4’s Afternoon Play slot. Given that the plot concerns a sound recordist in a spooky fen I’m betting this is going to play out pretty damn eerily. I’m game.

The Ditch
By Paul Evans; Performed by a full cast
1 Broadcast – Approx. 45 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Afternoon Play
Broadcast: Monday February 1st, 2010 @14:15
Tom Saunders, a wildlife sound recordist, goes missing, leaving only a collection of recordings and a notebook. These fall into the hands of his radio producer, who tries to piece together what has happened. His quest leads him back to the disturbing aural landscape of Slaughton Ditch, where an obsession with hidden sounds has terrifying and fatal consequences.
Recorded on location, this chilling tale is written and narrated by Paul Evans.

Cast:
Tom Saunders …… Jimmy Yuill
Narrator …… Paul Evans
Other parts played by Christine Hall and Richard Angwin

Wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson

Directed by Sarah Blunt

I expect an MP3 of this will plop itself into my Radio Downloader folder shortly after it appears online. Is that how most of you get your BBC Afternoon Play fix too? Or are you all using RadioArchive.cc? Are you using the BBC iPlayer? Surely you’re not streaming it online? That’d be weird.

[Thanks Roy!]

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBCR4 + RA.cc: Double Indemnity

Aural Noir: Online Audio

For me Double Indemnity is the best of Film Noir. It takes the filmic art form to the highest of the black and white heights. It faithfully captures James M. Cain’s novella like no other film has done with any novel.

When I read about this BBC radio dramatization of Double Indemnity I kept my expectations low – that probably helped me enjoy it all the more – but I can’t imagine any fan of either the novel or the film being disappointed by this rare gem. It is more than terrific! Theresa Russell as Phyllis Deitrichson is superior to Barbara Stanwyck‘s iconic role. Her performance has me wanting to watch Black Widow again.

Double Indemnity
Based on the novella by James M. Cain;
Adapted by John Fletcher; Performed by a full cast
1 MP3 (via torrent) – 1 Hour 29 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Saturday Night Theatre
Broadcast: 1993

Cast:
Walter Huff …. Frederic Forrest
Lola …. Molly Ringwald
Phyllis …. Theresa Russell
Keyes …. John Wood
Nerdlinger …. Michael Drew
Norton …. John Goraczio
Jackson …. John Baddeley
Nettie …. Geraldine Fitzgerald
Zachetti …. Roger May

Original Music by Barrington Pheloung
Technical presentation by Graham Hoyland, Dave Parkinson, Andrew Lawrence, Fiona Baker, Christine Hall, Mark Decker
Directed at Christchurch Studios in Bristol by Andy Jordan

You can get Double Indemnity via TORRENT at RadioArchive.cc.

And speaking of FILM NOIR, has anybody got room for a hitchhiker? I’d really like to be in San Fransisco by tomorrow afternoon…

NOIR CITY from Film Noir Foundation on Vimeo.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The Pulp Reader’s project and some audio drama picks

SFFaudio News

The Pulp Reader blog is an ongoing experiment in “computer generated audio books.” Sez the webmaster (Shonokin):

I read a lot. I also drive a lot, stuck in long commutes every day. There’s a way for a reader and a commuter to do both at the same time. And for me that is through audiobooks. But alas, most of the books I’d like to listen to are not available anywhere, so what to do? Make my own and that’s mostly what this is about. I create Text To Speech (TTS) audiobooks for my daily commute. Since I make them, I might as well share them. So here we are!

Shonokin places the files on Archive.org and then links to them on his/her blog. Shonokin started this project in 2006. And coincidently in 2006 I had a similar problem myself. There were a lot of ebooks out there that weren’t being turned into audiobooks. But with me being a hater of the robot voice I came up with the SFFaudio Challenges |First|Second|Third|Fourth| to solve my dilemma instead.

What Shonokin and I can both agree on, I’m betting, is that audio drama is not best done not by robots* – but by people – real people! Not those damned thieving “Silicon Americans” that Shonokin is employing.

Anyway, here are Shonokin’s thoughts on some recent human done shows that he/she has been listening to:

First off, there’s my love hate relationship with Wormwood, an excellent supernatural detective mystery. The acting is mostly good, the stories are sharp and exciting and the incidental music and sounds effects are great. My only complaint is that it is mixed very poorly. In situations such as driving in a car or surrounded by other ambient noise, you may find you have to fiddle with the volume knob of your radio or mp3 player to alternately listen to quiet dialog and back off on sudden crashing loud jabs of sound. Quite unpleasant aurally, but the stories are good enough to keep me going, annoyed as I am.

Also, the latest seasons of Black Jack Justice and Red Panda have started, which are a joy all the way around. Red Panda is a fun detective pulp with sprinkles of scifi/fantasy and comic book hero action. Black Jack Justice is a hard-boiled detective comedy. Both are great fun but written and played in very different styles.

And then there is also McLevy, an audio drama from the BBC which airs weekly on their iplayer. I find this to be a very fascinating series and have put together a mini webpage about him. In short, James McLevy was a real detective in 1800’s Edinburgh. He wrote several memoirs about his exploits which were very popular. There’s some speculation that aside from the obvious homages to his teacher, Doctor Joseph Bell, that Arthur Conan Doyle may have gleaned some bits of inspiration for Sherlock Holmes from McLevy’s memoirs.

I was fascinated by stumbling across the existence of McLevy but have not found an ultimate website or font of information about him, which is why I put this together. Please visit McLevy The Edinburgh Detective to find out more.

[via The Pulp Reader blog]

*with apologies to Robotz Of The Company for slander.

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC Radio 4: The Three Knots

SFFaudio Online Audio

Radio Times - Afternoon Play: The Three Knots - reviewed by Jane Anderson Next Tuesday BBC Radio 4’s Afternoon Play is The Three Knots. This atmospheric drama is set against the backdrop of the “Disruption” during which Scotland’s church split in two. It’s inspired by a real community who, having been refused any land to worship on by the laird, commissioned a floating kirk which they harboured in Loch Sunart.

Afternoon Play: The Three Knots
By Linda Cracknell; Performed by a full cast
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Afternoon Play
Broadcast: December 22, 2009 @14:15-15:00
Drama about faith and the supernatural by Linda Cracknell, set in 19th-century Scotland. Two men stranded on a mountain on a stormy December night meet a mysterious old woman who believes she can control the elements.

Cast:
Angus …… Finn den Hertog
Thomas …… Robert Jack
Old Woman …… Gerda Stevenson
Elizabeth …… Hannah Donaldson
Minister …… Jimmy Chisholm

Directed by Kirsty Williams

Sez the author, Linda Cracknell, on her blog:

I spent two days at the end of last week at the BBC in Glasgow to sit in on the recording of my new play The Three Knots. It was great fun to return to that world after several years away. I heard the words I had hounded down and harnessed through numerous drafts springing into new life, was awed that they could mobilise five actors, a Director, three audio staff, an administrator and a whole world of electronic sound effects into a collaborative act of creation. To witness the nuances of meaning and subtext teased out through the sensibilities of the actors and Director; to remember that fewer words often mean more power; and to find that a terrifying storm can be invoked by layerings of sound, is a huge privilege. For the solitary fiction writer, this is a radically different, and a most exciting way of working.

The Three Knots is the realisation of an idea seeded at least three years ago when, while looking through back copies of the Scots magazine in the National Library of Scotland for something else, I stumbled upon an engraving of a remarkable vessel arriving on Loch Sunart in the West Highlands in 1846. It remained anchored there for ten years, and played a highly significant role in the spiritual and political life of the local community. I was intrigued. I have written about how it captivated me before, here. I walked the hills there, and started to inhabit the place with my imagined characters, until they grew, gathered to themselves relationships, conflicts, mythical associations, and so shaped a story.

Sounds like it might be good eh?

[Thanks Roy!]

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC Radio 4: The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz RADIO DRAMA

SFFaudio Online Audio

Radio Times - The Saturday Play - The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz reviewed by Jane Anderson Do you like your roads yellow bricked?

Do you prefer your lions cowardly?

How about your scarecrows?

You like them brainless right?

I knew you did.

The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz
Based on the novel by L. Frank Baum; Adapted by Linda Marshall; Performed by a full cast
1 Broadcast – Approx. 1 Hour [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Saturday Play
Broadcast: December 19, 2009 @ 14:30-15:30
When a tornado strikes her farmhouse in Kansas, young Dorothy is lifted to the magical world of Oz, where she embarks upon a perilous journey to find her way back home.

Cast:
Dorothy …… Amelia Clarkson
Wizard of Oz/Kalidah/Uncle Henry …… Jonathan Keeble
Scarecrow …… Kevin Eldon
Tinman …… Burn Gorman
Lion …… Zubin Varla
Witch of the North/South/West/Aunt Em …….Emma Fielding
King Monkey/Miner …… Andrew Westfield
Munchkin/Gatekeeper …… Graeme Hawley

With Original Music by Olly Fox

Directed by Nadia Molinari

First published in the USA in 1900, and constantly in print since then, L. Frank Baum’s novel of Kansas and another world is the first in a series of 14 books that have entered the public domain in the USA. Though there have been many adaptations – most notably the 1939 film, radio dramatizations have been few and far between.

Incidentally, TellTaleWeekly.org, a website I shamefully haven’t mentioned in a few years, has an excellent DRM-free audiobook version of The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz available for download (and it’s cheap @ just $6.00). |READ OUR REVIEW|

Audiobook fans who prefer the simplicity and immediacy of a LibriVox audiobook should also take note of the all public domain edition of The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz available for FREE over on LibriVox.org!

[Thanks to the man behind the curtain, Roy!]

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC + RR.cc: McLevy: a 19th century detective series based on a real detective

Aural Noir: Online Audio

Paul Bishop, who runs the addictive Bish’s Beat blog, writes about an unfamiliar audio drama series that sounds right up our dark alley!

Sez Paul:

“McLevy!

THESE TOP NOTCH AUDIO DRAMAS FROM BBC 4 SURROUNDING INSPECTOR MCLEVY, A TACITURN, VICTORIAN, EDINBURGH SLEUTH, HIS GIRLFRIEND BROTHEL OWNER JEAN BRASH, AND HIS SIDEKICK CONSTABLE MULHOLLAND, ARE A JOY. ORIGINALLY BROADCAST FROM 1999 TO 2006, GOOD WRITING, GOOD CASTING, AND GOOD DIRECTION MAKE THIS FORTY-FIVE MINUTE SHOW A MUST FOR YOUR BBC DOWNLOADER . . .”

Indeed! Though I think a visit to RadioArchive.cc will be even more effiecent!

From “Snuffbox” a collector and moderator on RadioArchive.cc:

The dark broodings of James McLevy, a dour Scots detective created by writer James Ashton, are based loosely on the stories of a real-life police inspector. James McLevy was a County Armagh-born builder’s labourer who embarked on a police career in the 1830s and published several collections of his cases.

Ashton’s McLevy, however, is a far deeper and darker character, a man obsessed with meting out justice, and with demons of his own.

Brian Cox is superb as the brooding coffee addict McLevy, ably supported by his sharp side-kick Constable Mulholland. Running throughout the series is McLevy’s love-hate cat-and-mouse realationship with the delicious Jean Brash, propriortress of Edinburgh’s premier bawdy-hoose.

Cast:
McLevy … Brian Cox
Mulholland … Michael Perceval-Maxwell
Jean Brash … Siobhán Redmond
Lt. Roach … David Ashton

Pilot 1999
1. McLevy
1st Series 2000
2. For Unto Us
3. The Trophy Club
4. The Second Shadow
5. The Burning Question
2nd Series 2002
6. A Good Walk Spoilt
7. Wild Justice
8. The Wild Spark
9. Stab in the Back
3rd Series 2003
10. Behind the Curtain
11. A Voice from the Grave
12. The Dark Shadow
13. Servant of the Crown
4th Series 2006
14. A Piece of Cake
15. The Sea Change
16. Sins of the Fathers
17. The Devil’s Disguise
5th Series 2009
18. To Keep Him Honest
19. Picture of Innocence
20. The Chosen One
21. The Reckoning

2 episodes are also available on CD |HERE|

[via Bish’s Beat]

Posted by Jesse Willis