Drama's best on the radio

BY ANNETTE MÜRER

'It's brilliant here! We're actually in the middle of a boom. I can't think of a better way of putting it.'

Nils Heyerdahl is clearly enjoying his tenure at the helm of the celebrated Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation's radio drama department - NRK Radioteatret. Not only is he thrilled by the decision to award the 2003 Prix Europa (drama production category) to young playwright Christopher Grøndahl for his play Risk, his 'invisible theatre' has also developed into an exciting place for fresh talent. Because writing for the movies is not the only thing young writers want to do. Productions from the radio drama department are aired on the NRK's radio channels P1, P2, Petre and the corporation's website at NRK.no. Norwegian premiers are mounting - they amount to 15 a year already - and its large audience gives the department a unique position.

Scouting for talent

'We have about 20 million listeners on a yearly basis,' Heyerdahl tells us happily. 'That figure is rising, but it obviously fluctuates. We do have four different sub-departments, and although 3-400,000 people tune into our crime serials our main modern and classical drama department (which broadcasts on P2) attracts regularly between 40 and 80,000 listeners. Satire is enormously popular, and Radioteatret has the biggest theatre in Norway for children and young people. We are pretty spoilt because quality remains the bottom line; we don't have to keep our eyes pinned on the ratings. Radio drama is also a relatively inexpensive way of producing drama, if you're thinking in money terms.

'So you can risk taking on new, unfamiliar writers?'

'Yes, but we don't just hang around cooling our heals, like an inert print publisher waiting for writers to knock on the door. We go to the right places and ask young scriptwriters who know a bit about dramaturgy if they would like to attend a course and find out what sound drama looks like. Tale Næss and the scriptwriter Per Schreiner did the course and their playwriting debuts were enormously exciting, which of course gives added inspiration, both for us and them, and it means that we're not standing still, new things are happening all the time. We get lots of inquiries from different places asking us to team up with them on projects; a scriptwriting course together with the Lillehammer Film School is one exciting idea. NRK's Radioteatret and Fjernsynsteatret (the television drama department) are now merged into a joint drama department. We retain our distinctive setups and production platforms, but we do get together to design joint projects aimed at fresh, young talent.

More freedom

'Up to now, younger writers seem to prefer to get involved in writing for movies. How do you plan on getting them interested in radio drama?'

'Well, films and radio share lots in common, much more than many people think before they see how things actually work around here. May be the type of visualisation provided by radio's sound imaging is more like film than drama at the theatre? We can let our imaginations run, we can splice, jump, focus on voices and atmosphere, and we can let our hair down in the action scenes, without disappearing out of the 'picture frame'. Obviously, script and direction are important, but we oughtn't to forget that sound design is usually the most basic ingredient.

'Radioteatret must be a blessing for actors?'

'Well, in the sense that they don't need to bother about looks or physical appearance, and still play the character, it is. It offers a wide range of openings for different types of actor, but that said, there's still quite a big difference from acting in a proper theatre, which many are used to. On the radio everything is conveyed via the voice alone. Only the voice matters. And the voice, it's the "little muscle of the soul".'

'Radioteatret produces a lot of CDs too, don't you?'

'Indeed we do. We've already clocked up 60 separate CD productions, and they 're selling. Some of our productions are published as books as well, by Solum Forlag. We've found that the public are quite interested in new productions of Henrik Ibsen's plays. The first ever production of an Ibsen play was actually the Peer Gynt we did back in 1926. It was done live. In connection with the events to mark the centenary of Ibsen's death in 1906, we're planning to broadcast new productions of all of his plays. We've done eighteen already, all available on CD, and there are more in the pipeline. It's obviously a big challenge, but it's given Radioteatret a real booster. Presenting Ibsen plays with fresh eyes and ears is good exercise! And with contemporary Ibsen drama and more and more new Norwegian plays appearing, Radioteatret has two legs to stand on. We look forward to every new day, there's so much happening in radio terms that's really exciting. And even if we are "invisible", it's obvious that more and more people are discovering us. That's inspiring, too!' says radio drama's boss, Nils Heyerdahl.

Annette Mürer is a writer and theatre critic