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Chung Wai Ming Talks about the Production of Radio Dramas

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In the 1950s and 60s, the production of a radio play began with inviting a script writer to write the script; most of the early radio dramas were adapted from stage plays, such as “Thunderstorm” and “Sunrise”. After that came the casting. The production assistant was responsible for allocating the work, and arranging rehearsals. Since radio dramas were all aired live, going over the dialogue was very important, and usually it had to be done two to three times. Once we were happy with it, we would get the person in charge to arrange for rehearsals in the studio. After that, we rehearsed with the music and sound effects and timing, and so on. When the programme was finally broadcast, the dialogue went out instantaneously, with special technicians handling the sound effects. If the sound effects people slipped up, or if actors misread the script, we had to do what we could to save the day. For example, once, when we were supposed to make the sound of a baby crying and a dog’s barking sound came out by mistake, the actor said immediately, “That dog is barking again!” Only in the early 50s when Rediffusion started to sell programmes to Singapore and Malaya did the recording of programmes take place.

Martial arts radio dramas were once all the rage. I was fortunate to be coached by Chu Yu-chai, the disciple of Lin Shirong, who was in turn the disciple of the famous martial arts master Huang Feixiong; he coached me on the names of the particular moves and styles mentioned in the plays so that many listeners had the impression that I was very proficient in martial arts when in fact, I knew nothing about it. This passage for example, in which a character said, “He threw a punch at me, with great strength (and I had to speak with force to emphasize it); I wanted to test his skill, so I adopted another move, and put my hand on his arm. Once I perceived the level of his skill, I pushed his fist down, and used another move to repel his fist away, making a ‘swish’ sound.” When I got to these points, I would be moving my arms and legs in sync with the action in the story.

For detective dramas, however, we relied on the plot and music to create the suspense that appealed to listeners. The early Rediffusion drama “The Cases of Detective Kwok Lam” was very popular. So was “The Cases of Detective Wai Lun” produced by Radio Hong Kong in the ‘60s. When this play was aired, it would come to a stop five minutes before the programme was due to end. Listeners were invited to call in and guess the identity of the murderer, and a cash prize was offered for the right answer. Then during the last few minutes, the murderer’s identity would be revealed, and the audience would be told how the crime was solved.

In the ‘70s, Radio Hong Kong produced an enormous number of radio plays. Fifty-two hour-half programmes were produced every week and there was a wide range including detective stories, family dramas, romances, world literature, and a one-hour programme adapted from Shakespeare’s works. The workload was tremendous. The scripts were written by different writers. This was a result of audience demand and competition among radios. Popular radio dramas were also adapted for the screen. In fact, when movies needed publicity, they were adapted for the radio. I took part in stories publicizing the movies of Kwan Tak Hing. When his movies were soon to be screened, he would invite writers to adapt them as serialized drama to be broadcast over five days on different stations. Radio Hong Kong was not allowed to do commercial advertising and could agree only to air the play without advertising. When the plays were aired on Rediffusion or Commercial Radio however, at the most exciting point, they would come to a stop, and the audience would be told that in order to find out how the story ended they had to go to the cinema.

The golden age of radio broadcasting was between the 1940s and the ‘70s and ‘80s, but by the 21st century Radio Hong Kong, for instance, had even disbanded drama section. This was a result of television. The prime time of radio used to begin at six in the evening, but this was taken over by television so that radio was forced to make adjustments. One can say this was the beginning of a new era, the era of information. Nowadays, a programme can last several hours, and listener can phone in to make comments. In addition, radio dramas cost a lot to produce, having to pay scriptwriters, actors and other workers, while talk shows and musical programmes etc. are cheaper to produce. Most important of all, the audience is getting busier and busier so that the kind of leisurely enjoyment of radio listening is a thing of the past.

The radio drama actors of the 1940s had partly started as stage actors. Some were students who had been inducted to working on stage by their teachers after class. When Rediffusion was established, some of these students joined the radio and later brought their fellow students along with them. They even got their teachers to participate to strengthen the cast. Thus many of the early radio players had been adapted from stage plays. It was only later that writers were employed to create different genres of drama for the radio.



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