French Radio Drama

     It is within the context of private radio, and more specifically at CKAC-the first French-language radio station in North America, launched in 1922-that the first experiments in radio drama writing were developed. There have been close to 100 French radio drama series aired since 1923, lasting from one to ten years, and nearly 300 radio drama serials, which were aired by various Quebec radio stations, particularly by CKAC (1923 to 1955), CKVL (1948 to 1968), and CBF (1937 to 1972). Nearly 500 authors and more than 5,000 of their Que­bec creations had been broadcast up to 2000.

Origins of Radio Drama at CKAC

      On 5 April 1923, less than one year after its inauguration, CKAC broadcast its first radio play, "Felix Poutre" an 1871 classic of Quebec literature written by Louis Frechette that was produced by Jacques-Narcisse Cartier, the president and founder of CKAC. The production used 13 actors placed around a microphone and presented eventful moments from the trial of a Patriote in the Canadian Revolution of 1837, who was condemned to death but was saved from hanging thanks to his convincing mimicry of madness.

     The next step was to create a general cultural program, L'Heure provinciale (1929-39), funded by the Quebec government, which broadcast, aside from poetry and opera, excerpts from classical French and Quebec repertories. The producer of this program, Henri Letondal, drew from various theatrical publications, such as La Petite Illustration, for his choice of contemporary plays. La Demi-heure théâtrale du Docteur J.O. Lambert (19 33-37) also presented adaptations of European works and laid the ground for yet another phase, the development of a program dedicated to works from Quebec, Le Theatre de chez-nous (19 38-49), created by Henri Letondal. These radio plays explored typical Quebec situations, drawing from the comic, dramatic, psychological, and social essences of the culture and using a language marked by the vocabulary and accents of the 1930s.

     Radio productions from Quebec can be grouped into three types of dramatic writing, each of which left its mark on various eras: (1) radio dramas, (2) radio serials, and (3) comic sketches. Radio dramas stemming from stage productions were established at the end of the 1930s with the series "Le Theatre de chez-nous "; the radio play Un coucher de soleil ( 1942) by Henri Letondal is a good example of this genre. The radio drama was defined more as a style of radio writing during the 1950s, and it became a more distinctly experiential and symbolic language within the scope of the radio serial. Le Coureur de marathon (1951) by Claude Gauvreau, L'Homme qui regardait couler l'eau (1951) by Yvette Naubert, and Confession d'un héros (1961) by Hubert Aquin, as well as the works of Louis Pelland, Le Véridique procès de Barbe-bleue (1954) and Voltaire s'en vaten Canada (1971), are models of this trend.

     However, the first major works of radio were created within the genre of the serial: Le Cure de village (1935-38) and La Pension Velder (1937-42) by Robert Choquette, and Un homme et son péché (1939-65) by Claude-Henri Grignon. Then, during World War II, production increased, and works of note such as Jeunesse doree (1940-65) by Jean Desprez and La Fiancee du commando (1942-47) by Paul Gury were aired. During the 1950s and 1960s, themes became more diverse; a work of anticommunist propaganda during the Cold War stands out-Beni fut son berceau (1951) by Fran oise Lor­ anger-as does a portrait of regional and maritime life in Quebec's Gaspe region-Je vous ai tant aime (1951-54) by Jovette Bernier. The cycle of radio serials that developed from 1934 to 1974 included an original work based on criminal intrigue, Marie Tellier, avocate (1964-69) by Maurice Gagnon; crime shows were a genre rarely practiced at Radio-Canada. A characteristic of these radio serials was the use of short scenes that fragmented the plots and sectioned them into five 15-minute programs per week. The content was built around known character types, evolving within complex situations, which in turn were interlaced within several plots. A narrator explained the essential elements necessary for understanding the plot. The historical serial was generally built around a serie·s of programs in which the plot was completed within each episode, but each of these smaller plots also fit into a longer chronological narrative. Each program was a 30- or 60-minute weekly event. Le Ciel par-dessus les toits (1947- 55) by Guy Dufresne, L'Histoire du Canada (1957-60) by Jean Laforest, Histoire de Montréal (1967-68) by Yves Thériault, and Les Visages de l'Amour (1955-70) by Charlotte Savary are important works in this genre. Finally, comic sketches filled in certain daily niches, such as Quelles nouv­elles? (1939-58) by Jovette Bernier or Chez Miville (1956-70) with the authors Albert Brie, Louis-Martin Tard, Louis Landry, and Michel Dudragne. These authors developed a characteristic language and dialogue structure, making good use of witticisms, puns, irony, and situational comedy revolving around archetypal characters. The themes explored were sociopolitical and served as a focal point for a critique of Quebec society in the 1960s, the period of the Quiet Revolution in Quebec.

From Private Radio at CKAC to Public Radio at CRCM and CBF

      By the end of the 1930s, the status of the principal radio genre was sufficiently strengthened that public radio in Canada could propose a programming schedule that contained the principle models already being used at CKAC. Between 1932 and 1936, the Canadian Broadcasting Commission (CBC) set in place an important programming schedule while Canada waited for the law that would create public radio, CBC/Societe Radio-Canada (1936). Two series broadcast on CRCM are worth mentioning: Promenades en Nouvelle-France (1933-34) by Robert Choquette, which presented historical portraits, and Le Fabuliste La Fontaine à Montréal (1934) by the same author, which consisted of 15 half-hour comedies. These programs projected a humorous and ironic image of Montreal's bourgeois society. At CBF, launched on 3 November 1937, many years would go by before original Quebec creations would be broadcast within specially designed programs such as the series Radio-theatre canadien (1951-53), even though radio serials were already being broadcast at CBF as early as 1938. During CBF's first 15 years, the station offered works principally by classical and contemporary authors from the international literary scene. These important radio drama series included Le Radiotheatre de Radio-Canada (1943-5 6), the drama segment of Radio-College (1941-56), which in 1951 became Sur toutes les scenes du monde (1951-75).

Influences of the Massey Report on French Canadian Radio Drama at CBF

      In the wake of the Massey Report (1951) on Canadian arts and culture, a program was developed, specifically dedicated to young authors, in order to encourage Quebec creations. The program Nouveautés dramatiques (1950-62), produced by Guy Beaulne, proposed works from numerous authors; some of these works were, from a dramatic perspective, of very high quality. Other works of note include Zone interdite (19 50), a series written by Pierre Dagenais; Flagrant delit, Billet de faveur (1955 ), and Les Ineffables (1956), series produced by Hubert Aquin; and Le Theatre canadien (1955). All of these series presented works by young authors such as Jacques Lan­ guirand, Luan Asllani, Marcel Blouin, and Georges Cartier, who explored, among other genres, the tradition of theatre of the Absurd at the urging of producer Aquin. During the 1960s, two series stood out: Le Petit theatre de poche (1965) and Studio d'essai (1968), but one must note that their authors wrote more frequently for television. The 1970s ushered in a revival of radio drama broadcasting. Premieres (1971-86) ​​became the major series, airing the plays of many Quebec authors whose inventiveness, research, and thematic development rejuvenated radio writing. The series Escale (1978-83) offered a variety of literary genres: radiophonic short stories, introspective radio dramas, and tales of fantasy or whimsy, as well as monologues and comedic dialogues. La Feuillaison (1972-87), produced by Jean-Pierre Saulnier, continued in the tradition of experimental theater. Each of these series submitted its best scripts to the international contest organized by La Communaute radiophonique des Programmes de langue frani;aise, which awards Le Prix Paul Gilson.

Rupture in Programming and Revival of Radio Drama

     If the end of the 1980s marked a rupture in the programming of radio drama at CBF-FM, because the important series had ended by 1987, producers Claude Godin and Line Meloche, beginning in 1991, nevertheless returned to the airwaves with two experimental series: Videoclip and Atelier de creation radiophonique. Jean-Pierre Saulnier proposed a historical series for the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the discovery of America; Saulnier produced a work by Yves Sioui­ Durand and Catherine Joncas, La Redécouverte de l'Amérique (1992), a wonderfully poetic drama. The next year, Line Meloche produced another historical serial, Les Fils de la liberté (1993) by Louis Caron (scripted by Annie Pierard). By the mid-1990s, "radiofiction" opened up toward new aural and thematic aesthetics. Line Meloche was the originator of this change. Radio language in the 1990s was in a state of transformation: explorations included fantasy, tales of crime and espionage, and the new techniques of communication. Concurrently, another original experiment was undertaken by producer and author Cynthia Dubois on the theme of erotism. The series Je vais et je viens entre les mots (1995-96) demonstrated the author's outstanding creativity. Dubois also wrote L'Arbre de vie (1997-), a very postmodern work, with its splintered structure incorporating diverse forms of dialogue within a theme in which the couple and the family are the two polar extremes. Between the acerbic dialogue of the conflicting lovers, an interview, an open-line show, or even a monologue could be interjected, all of which converge to create a new dynamic between the author, the characters, the actors, and the listeners.

     In radio drama writing, particularly since the end of the 1980s, the treatment of sound has in many ways amplified the construction of meaning. The themes are increasingly supported by the sound effects and the musical selections, the role of which is just as important as scenery and costumes are for stage productions. Furthermore, it has been discovered that textual structure on the radio can support quoted aural inserts, flashbacks, superimposed sophisticated sound effects in the foreground, and very powerful musical sound environments that at times can drown out the voices of the actors or bring about a reduction of the narrative function. Introspective narration has been used extensively in order to convey a particular sense of time and an interior or exterior space different from that of the main narrative voice-a traditional technique that has been given a new contextual function in recent productions. The statements become more complex, supported by more sophisticated technical processes (filters, vocal interplay, distances from the microphone) and by the use of nonlinear and ever more diversified dramatic structures.

Producers

     After Jacques-Narcisse Cartier, the first radio producer, Henri Letondal, Robert Choquette, and Fred Barry followed; all of these laid the foundation for the first models of dramatic productions at CKAC. A few names should be added, because at CBF, Jacques Auger, Guy Mauffette, Lucien Theriault, Armand Plante, and Florent Forget all played determining roles in the success of certain productions between 1930 and 1950. In the 1950s and 1960s, producers continued a tradition of defining radio as an art form and leaning toward a more diverse aural aesthetic. Their experiments were all milestones on the road leading to an artistic vision of dramatic writing in Quebec. Their work was an exploration of the new technical means that opened the way to research into the modernity of the language of radio. The early 1970s were a watershed period in the history of Quebec radio theater, where a new interrogation of the specificity of sound began with Madeleine Gerome, Jean­ Pierre Saulnier, and Gerard Binet. One of Jacques Languirand's works, "Feed back" (1971), was significant in this respect because it used the resources of sound recording in order to give structure to the idea of the failure of communication-as it became obsession following a nuclear holocaust-by the repetition of the same aural and narrative motifs. The radio play by Monique Bosco, "Le Cri de la folle enfouie clans l'asile de la mort" (1978), produced by Madeleine Gerome, presented a sound creation by musician Gabriel Carpentier and was pro­ posed for the Italia Prize. "Belles de nuit" (1983) by Yolande Villemaire, produced by Jean-Pierre Saulnier, won an award, the Prix du concours des oeuvres radiophoniques de Radio­ Canada. It must also be noted that producers experimented with new styles in a context of the production of meaning in which the symbolic system of sound participated as an equal partner. During the past decade, producers have explored freer forms and new musical and sound effect codes, which have served as support for new themes and acting techniques.

     Since the autumn of 1996, and each season since, a dramatic series, Radiofictions en direct, has been broadcast live on the French network, CBF-FM, of La Societe Radio-Canada. These radio events, played live in a concert hall, call upon the talents of musicians, a sound effects technician, and actors whose experience ensures an exceptional level of quality to the broadcasts. The producer, Line Meloche, has succeeded in rekindling interest at the end of the century for an art form in which radio theater and stage theater find a common ground.

English Radio Drama

     Early English-Canadian radio drama was much influenced by radio drama in the United States as practiced by the pioneer networks the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) and the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) from the late 1920s. By the mid-1930s drama was American radio's most popular form: from the many popular dramatic series-mystery and adventure, soap opera, variety, and comedy-to the prestigious "sustaining" (unsponsored) anthology dramatic series, serious and experimental. The earliest of these were NBC's Radio Guild, which started in 1929, and the CBS Columbia Workshop, which began in 1931. Their experimental techniques were aimed at adapting the universal dramatic mode to the limitations and strengths of this new sound-based medium. By 1938, of the 26 leading American evening radio programs, 20 were dramatic. Radio drama was gaining recognition as a distinct creative and technical mode of theater.

     Although there were some early radio-drama experiments in Canada starting in the mid-1920s, the most popular radio​​drama programs among English-speaking Canadians through the 1930s were the American dramatic series. These were received by Canadians from powerful distant American stations or were broadcast by Canadian affiliates of the major American radio networks. Some were even broadcast by the first Canadian network, the Canadian National Railways Radio Department (CNR Radio) from the late 1920s, and by the nationalized English-Canadian networks that followed it: the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Commission (CRBC) from 1933 until 1936 and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) thereafter. These pioneer American radio dramas had a strong influence on early Canadian dramas in this medium.

     The golden age of American radio drama was the decade of the 1930s. Although there were some important American radio-drama achievements even until the mid-1950s, American television soon captured sponsors, budgets, and audiences, relegating American radio to a secondary role. This U.S. cultural and commercial transformation from radio to television was the opportunity for naturalized Canadian radio to complete its own network of radio-drama production centers in the 1940s and to achieve its own golden age. Unlike French-Canadian radio drama, important productions of which were broadcast on several private stations as well as on the French-language CBC (Radio-Canada), most significant English-language Canadian radio drama was produced on only the CBC. Although CBC drama "producers" (each one both produced and directed) learned many basic technical and creative lessons from American popular and serious radio dramas, CBC radio drama did develop original creative styles and techniques in the 1940s and 1950s, particularly under its senior producers, Andrew Allan and Esse W. Ljungh. The Canadian golden age of radio drama lasted until well into the 1960s.

The Beginnings of English-Canadian Radio Drama: CNR Radio, CKUA, and the CRBC

     The earliest English-Canadian radio-drama network broadcasts were produced from mid-1925 at the Moncton, New Brunswick, station of CNR Radio. They were mainly popular post-Victorian stage plays, transposed to radio without much understanding of the need for adaptation to the sound medium, especially to its lack of visual dramatic cues. The first regular weekly anthology drama series in Canada, called the CNRV Players, began broadcasts over CNR Radio's national network in 1926; it was written by Jack Gillmore and produced by him over station CNRV in Vancouver. These broadcasts included adaptations of Shakespeare and other classical plays and fictions, adaptations of many standard modern stage plays, and a few original radio plays commissioned by Gill­. He grasped the distinctive nature of radio drama, and his radio adaptations for this new sound medium accommodated its strengths and limitations, even before the 192.9 start of the NBC Radio Guild. Gillmore's series lasted until the 1932 nationalization of the CNR Network, which became the CRBC.

     Another pioneer radio-drama series, the CKUA Players, was broadcast throughout the 1930s over CKUA, the independent radio station of the University of Alberta. Produced mainly by Sheila Marryat, it included some original plays by such Canadian writers as Gwen Pharis Ringwood and Elsie Park Gowan. From the late 1930s, this series was also broadcast over an informal western Canadian radio network and even over the CBC's regional and national networks.

     An ambitious series of dramatizations of Canadian history called Romance of Canada had been commissioned by CNR Radio in 1930. The dramatist chosen was Merrill Denison, a well-known Canadian stage writer. The producer was Tyrone Guthrie, a London theater director who had begun his career as a writer and producer of British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) radio dramas (and who would return 20 years later to found the Stratford, Ontario, Shakespeare Festival). Guthrie produced the first 14-play season of Romance of Canada. The plays of the second season were directed by his protege Rupert Caplan, also a stage professional, who had just returned from acting at the ProvinceTown Playhouse in New York. Caplan went on to a long career as a senior producer of radio drama­ first for CNR Radio; then, after it was nationalized, for the CRBC; and finally for its successor, the CBC.

     Between its founding in 1933 and its transformation in 1936, the CRBC increased the number of its weekly English­ language radio-drama series to as many as 17. Its best-known national series was Rupert Caplan's Radio Theatre Guild (a name echoing NBC's Radio Guild), which broadcast original Canadian, American, and European plays. Also very popular were The Youngbloods of Beaver Bend and a series produced by Don Henshaw, Forgotten Footsteps.

CBC Radio Drama's Golden Age

     When the CRBC became the CBC in 1936 (mainly a political change of administration), its first national supervisor of drama, Rupert Lucas, further expanded the radio-drama offerings of the network, including not only adaptations from Shakespeare and the theater classics and from classical fiction, but also some original plays and documentaries written primarily for radio. Lucas established a national radio-drama series at CBC Toronto and set up parallel regional production units in Montreal, Winnipeg, and Vancouver, each with its own major regional series.

     When Canada entered World War II in 1939, the CBC began to make educational and propaganda programs for its nationwide audiences, as the American networks were to do starting in 1941. On the other hand, the CBC never abandoned its practice of ambitious original radio-drama productions, which survived the war to become, in effect, the National Canadian Theatre. The visionary who accomplished this was Andrew Allan, who had worked in Toronto from the mid- 193os as a radio producer of popular plays and variety shows; he worked in England from 1937 and returned to Canada in September 1939 to become regional drama producer in Vancouver. There he earned an impressive reputation as a producer of original play series, particularly Vancouver Theatre, and as the organizer of an excellent repertory company of writers and actors. With the departure of Rupert Lucas for NBC in New York in 1943, Allan was appointed national drama supervisor in his place, a position he held until 1955. He invited many of his Vancouver repertory team to work with him in Toronto, particularly the actor John Drainie and the writers Fletcher Markle, Len Peterson, and Lister Sinclair (who was also an excellent actor). Allan added to his CBC Toronto repertory company a number of other Canadian dramatists and actors as well as the composer-conductor Lucio Augustini. He also invited Esse W. Ljungh to Toronto to help produce the growing number of national series.

     One of Allan's first acts as CBC drama supervisor in 1944 was to create an hour-long weekly national anthology series of original Canadian radio plays out of Toronto, called Stage (Stage '44, Stage '45, etc., later CBC Stage). The year Stage was founded-1944-marks the beginning of the. Canadian golden age of radio drama. This was made possible partly because (as noted) American radio's golden age largely ended with the postwar introduction of television. Allan's major goal for the Stage series was to create a professional Canadian theater. Although there were many experienced Canadian actors and dramatists and an excellent semi professional Dominion Drama Festival, until 1944 there was no professional stage­ theater institution in Canada, as existed in many other countries. This was mainly because professional American and British theater companies dominated (and often physically owned) the major stage theaters in Canadian cities, and these companies mainly offered popular American and British stage plays. Allan believed that the CBC offered a unique opportunity to lay the foundation for a professional Canadian theatre drawing on Canadian plays, producers, and actors. He conceived the idea that the CBC Radio Drama Department could become Canada's first professional national theater, and thus the subtitle he gave to Stage: Canada's National Theatre on the Air. Allan produced virtually every play in this premier national anthology series until he retired as national drama supervisor in 1955, and he produced other plays in this series until 1960. All were real-time, live-to-air productions. Among Allan's best playwrights were Peterson, Sinclair, and Markle, but other notable playwrights included W.O. Mitchell, Patricia Joudry, Gerald Nixon, Reuben Ship, Joseph Schull, and Tommy Tweed.

     In 1947 Harry Boyle, CBC's program supervisor, created a second ambitious weekly national anthology series, called CBC Wednesday Night, which broadcast a schedule of original radio plays and important classical and modern European and American dramas and adaptations. Each lengthy Wednesday Night program also included related talks or documentaries and often music, providing a whole cultural evening. The plays in this series were produced by the four senior CBC producers, Allan, Esse Ljungh, J. Frank Willis (also CBC head of features), all out of Toronto, and Rupert Caplan (of Romance of Canada fame) from Montreal. That same year, the physical network of CBC regional drama production centers was completed, with facilities at Halifax and Calgary. By 1947, then, CBC was broadcasting weekly: two anthology series of full-length plays, plus a major half-hour drama series from each of its six regional studios. From the early 1940s to the early 1960s, some 600 serious dramas were produced by the CBC, at least half of them original dramas for radio. During the 1950s the CBC broadcast in total some 20 weekly CBC English-language radio-drama series, including also the whole panoply of popular dramatic forms lost to American radio with the coming of television to the United States in the mid-1940s.

Mature and Shrinking CBC Radio Drama after 1960

     By the mid-1950s conditions became less ideal for Canadian radio drama. CBC Television's English network began in 1952, soon to be joined by a private television network, CTV, each with several drama series. As in the United States, television gradually began to steal away both drama professionals from CBC Radio and radio's audiences for drama. The Shakespeare Festival at Stratford, Ontario, one of the first professional Canadian stage companies, was also founded in the early 1950s by Tyrone Guthrie (the creator of Romance of Canada); it also lured away CBC Radio's drama-trained theater professionals. The Stratford Festival was soon joined by a growing number of other professional stage companies, beginning the movement toward a mature Canadian professional stage-theater institution, which burgeoned in the 1970s. Allan's vision was being realized, and, ironically but inevitably, it was weakening his original radio-drama creation. Nevertheless, Allan's successor, Esse W. Ljungh, produced and sponsored many notable plays in the mature CBC sound medium from 1955 to the mid-197os.

     By the late 1960s, the CBC Radio Drama Department, having lost its function as the only professional medium for Canadian drama, gradually reduced production. Being outside the spotlight was nevertheless an opportunity for the next generation of national producers, John Reeves in Toronto and Gerald Newman in Vancouver, to experiment with new dramatic forms and techniques. These experiments were aided by the 1960s move from live-to-air performances to taped productions, which came to resemble the out-of-sequence recording practiced in film production; however, radio plays also lost the edge of the previous live productions. With the growth of television as the major entertainment medium, Canadian radio (like American radio almost a generation before) was gradually changing into a medium for mainly music, news, and talk. Although Stage and Wednesday Night (later known as Tuesday Night) continued until the mid-1970s, the institution of CBC radio drama built up in the first decades was slowly disappearing.

     There was a revival of cultural radio in the 1980s, and the number of national anthology drama series grew again. A subtle change, though, was taking place in the way listeners were being addressed. As a policy decision, CBC English radio drama became more populist in form and content and was aimed at a more general audience. A new flagship series of original Canadian radio plays, Sunday Matinee, was founded, but there was also the more populist Vanishing Point and Ste­ reo Theatre and the dramas on Morningside. By the early 1990s, partly because of drastic cuts in government funding, none of the above series had survived in its original forms, and CBC radio drama was once more shrinking. The 1990s witnessed the disappearance of the previous forms and functions of CBC's former "Senior Service," the Radio Drama Department. Nevertheless, exemplary radio theater, serious and popular, is still being produced by the CBC in the new millennium. Canadian audiences can continue to experience the particular sound theater offered by radio and can learn how to use their imaginations to apprehend the sound images and the strong emotional communication of this unique dramatic form.