Audiodrama

NOW:

Dr Who

Most recently I played Yinka – a pro-robot activist working undercover as a training facilitator in A Force of Nature (6.1 of The Robots) by Big Finish Productions, (makers of the Dr Who audio-drama series), in a cast headed by Nicola Walker and Claire Rushbrook. It was released in April, 2023. In this clip, Yinka warns robot SV113 not to blow her cover.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Big Finish Productions Ltd (April 2023)

Riverside

In 2022 I played Ruby in the podcast mini-series Riverside – set in a fictional northern town. The stories were created by Glenda Young and scripted and adapted by Ian Skillicorn. Ruby, although a hopeless romantic, is also an indomitable spirit. In this clip Ruby regains that spirit after her longed-for wedding is aborted mid-service.

From an Island

In 2021 I played Melissa Bradley, (a.k.a. ‘The Snoop’) – the much feared Government Minister in From an Island - a podcast mini-series set in a future English dystopia, and compiled from “found” audio clips from an England isolated from the outside world for over 39 years. Bradley is plotting to overturn the government.

Written and produced By Ben Burrell
From An Island is a Fuelled By Coffee production

Little Bones

After more than 40 years, I stepped back eagerly into audio-drama in 2020 - recording a dramatised insert for the audiobook thriller Little Bones by N.V. Peacock, with ID Audio studios, London. Mrs Doncaster reminisces about her son, on a ‘podcast’ designed to help find his murderer.

Make it stand out

Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

THEN:

My love of radio drama began early in my life as an actor. I left The Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 1977, and managed a couple of plays with the BBC in Birmingham and Bristol (The Moonstone, by Wilkie Collins) in 1978, before marrying an Australian and emigrating to Australia in 1979.

I was delighted to discover the welcoming ABC Radio Drama department in Melbourne. After several guest roles I played the title role in Minna Von Barnhelm – a modern adaptation of Lessing’s German eighteenth century comedy.

The following autumn found me weeping and wailing on a Melbourne beach with a huge, fluffy microphone swaying above me, playing the lead role as Stella in Footmarks in the Sand. I have absolutely no idea what I was weeping and wailing about, but a photograph of me on my knees doing so confirmed that it happened. We were experimenting – seeing if the background of real waves made it even more compelling for the listener. I suspect it didn’t – it just made my knees wet!

No Place for a Nervous Lady followed in 1982. I played an assortment of English governesses , all struggling to come to terms with life in outback nineteenth century Australia.

Not long afterwards, the ABC was reconfigured, and the radio drama department was deployed to Adelaide or Perth – I forget which; but certainly too far for the actors who had been the staple of the Melbourne productions. That put an end to my audio performances for 24 years, until 2006 when back in the UK. With producer Ian Skillicorn I recorded fifteen short stories between then and 2012 for his former online platform www.shortstoryradio, and several years later two more with The Story Player, also begun by Ian, where I can still be heard reading The Canary by Katherine Mansfield.