YOU'RE ON THE AIR

You're on the Air   by Barbara Biddison

​I sat in on a final rehearsal for this radio show in the Coolidge
Theatre.  The live audiences won't get to see all the pre-show prep
that entertained me for about a half hour, but I'm here to tell you
that it's pretty interesting.  And the sound effects people are every
bit as important and well rehearsed as those with speaking roles.  It
runs August 19, 20, 21.

So the first "row" of the performing space consists of tables with
every kind of sound that you can imagine including a small door with
doorknob opening and closing, bells of all sorts, and people whose
sole job it is to operate the sound effects exactly on time.  (They
sometimes use their personal bodies (hands for slaps and mouths for
sounds, for effects also.)  Day-dreamers need not apply for these
human positions.

Behind the row for sound effects, we find the human characters.
Again, you have to pay attention.  These real human people with real
human voices convey age (little child, crotchety old guy, lovely young
woman with accent) and character with skill and fun.  And, because
this is LIVE radio we get to see their wonderful facial expressions
too.  Each person will voice different characters throughout the show
 As I see it, the trick for the audience is to simultaneously give
attention to voice for gender and age and accent as well as to facial
expression for mood.  And to keep an eye on the sound effects as well.
It's not "nap-time"!  And we get to see people on this stage who we've
seen in regular plays or musicals, and people who participate in
Acting Up and Out, and people we have, as far as we know, never seen
before in a theatre or walking down Main Street.  This radio
opportunity is all-inclusive.  Gabe Hakvaag directs  .

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