During an online lesson with Attila, we listened to a drama radio broadcast from 1938 – a take on H. G. Welles’ 1898 novel War of the Worlds. Orson Welles narrated a ‘fake news’ segment at 8-9 pm on the 30th October 1938, reporting discovery of mysterious hostile creatures near New York City. The believable beginning, of a spotting of Mars through a telescope and slow build-up to the action meant it wasn’t strange that some Americans thought it was a true story happening while they were listening in. 

We were then prompted to produce our own version of a dramatic, controversial radio broadcast, in which we decided to have a host discuss a ‘Pet Brexit’ with their audience. 

I drafted up a document to create an outline using the class’s ideas, including the concept, music and segments that we were going to include. On the next pages are the scripts for the ‘phone-ins’ and ‘interviews’ sections. Shortly after writing them, Adam recorded the first run-through via Zoom as everyone read their lines and Gareth added in a Foley sound effect of the static, by crumpling plastic. – We ran into some technical difficulties that Adam realised the next day, just meaning another run-through of everyone’s lines was needed, as they hadn’t picked up in the initial recording.