rambo, you will have to get in touch with Dido, our resident expert on all things connected with radio plays.
Do plays become the property of the radio station (eg BBC) that commissions them? Once they are broadcast does the author lose control over the script? Are there copyright laws involved?
Would your students be able to write their own script from a work of fiction?
Sorry I don't know any of the answers but if it works it could be an interesting project. ;-)

Here's one resource :

http://www.simplyscripts.com/radio.html

Here's another, larger list of available radio scripts :

http://www.simplyscripts.com/radio_all.html

Here are some royalty free scripts :

http://www.geocities.com/pocolocoplayers/free.html

I think you can buy scripts here :

http://www.playscripts.com/play.php3?playid=1064

Those should be some good starting points! ;-)

This is great, thanks dynomutt. As far as copyright, I will look into it, especially depending on what we do with it. I'd like to teach them pod casting, which would tie in well with recording of a radio play.

I've done script writing with older students before, but this is for a grade 8 class. I'm not sure I want to tackle play writing with them. This is actually for an oral communications course and my focus will be on vocal inflection.

Oh-scripts from the old radio mystery the Shadow would be great-just think of the announcer...."Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!" What fun trying that in inflections of horror, comedy, fear, anger, boredom....

rambo --

Yes, DO be careful about copyright. Canadian copyright law is a lot more restrictive than US copyright law.

I hear they're trying to overhaul the Copyright Act here in Canada but .... I'm not holding my breath. It might might not be a bad idea to err on the side of caution and look into what you might need to do to get in touch with the copyright holders.

Here's something that might be useful in figuring out what you might need to do :

http://library.concordia.ca/help/copyright/?guid=fdvsfu

rambo,

Radio plays - and radio dramatisations - remain the copyright of the writer/dramatist, if they're commissioned and broadcast by the BBC - the only broadcasting company in UK to commission Radio Drama. I've had a lot of stuff broadcast by BBCR4 over the last 20 years so I do know this.

Unfortunately, not many radio plays get published because there aren't many radio drama studios about and they are quite expensive to hire. Furthermore, when you write for radio, you write for that particular medium quite specifically in mind, more than you do with TV or Theatre. With some radio plays it's not easy to transfer them to another medium because, of course, in radio, the audience is 'blind' (remember the beginning of Under Milk Wood?) and the writer has to be permanently aware of this.

If I get started on this I'll never stop so I'm going to stop now. If you want any further info/advice that I am likely to be able to give, let me know. And, if you call up a UK website called 'Diversity', you'll find that, amongst other of the owner's passions (such as apples, certain kinds of music and many more), he has a pretty comprehensive and impressive list of Radio Dramatists which might help you. He's also very helpful if you want to contact him.

Dido

Rambo,

The website I mentioned above is Diversity Website at Sutton Elms (to identify it more closely; or if you just Google 'Radio Drama' it usually comes up). He's got an enormous collection of tapes (he might sell them, I don't know) of BBC Radio Drama from way back, a list of very many radio dramatists and their plays and he's always inviting more to join his database. I assume that your students listen to radio plays.

BBCRadio4 puts out a 45 minute original play every weekday afternoon, a 15minute serial every morning on Woman's Hour, a Classic Serial every Sunday afternoon, usually in 2 or 3 parts, a Friday Evening play, comedy serials on certain weekday mornings - it has an enormous output, and uses top, often world-class actors. Their producers, directors and engineers are very highly skilled indeed.

Dido

Great website, thank you. I'm planning for the next school year as my currents students are just writing exams now, to finish off the year. But my plan is to have them listen to a few radio plays in class and even explore more on their own before performing one.

I agree, I think the biggest challenge will be to acquire copies of the scripts. Once I have legal copies, according to the website dynomutt shared, I can perform the play without problem as long as it is only played/performed on site at the school, otherwise I'll have to seek permission of the copyright holder.