How do you know when you’re ready to start your story?
Sometimes it’s obvious you’re ready to start because you
can’t help yourself. You just start
writing, and four years later you realise you have an eight-hundred-page novel
and the editing job from hell.
However, if you live in my world than you have a brief for a
script, a deadline, a cast list and maybe an idea about a guy you saw on the
news the other day and this woman in the park who told you that you were a bad
father because you let your children play on the see-saw.
To help you get from vague ideas to something you can start
writing, I’m going to show you the four-question test. Not only will the four questions help you
solidify vague thoughts into something that will work as a play, it also works
pretty well as a pitch when you get asked “what is your play about” and all
you’ve got is “there’s this guy and something to do with a see-saw.” Ready?
Here goes.
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I am delighted to announce the longlist for the Little Wonder 2019 Breaking Boundaries Short Radio Play Competition:
- Buddha Hat by Clare Shaw
- Flamingo by Thoko Masikini
- Funeral by Miranda Barrett
- How I Almost Climbed Everest by Clare Knights
- Like Candy from a Baby by Michael Lin
- Relationship counselling with the croits by Tamsin Pearson
- That Day We Sat Together and Sang by Yuqun Fan
- The Fall by Zoe Grainge
- The Pride of Rotterdam by Tom Harvey
Warmest congratulations to everyone who made the longlist and commiserations to all who did not.
Longlistees will receive a email in the next day or so (all emails will be sent at the same time) with a detailed judges critique of their play. They will then have until Paris Midnight Sunday August 11th the revise and resubmit their play for consideration on the Shortlist.
The Shortlist will be announced on September 1st. Shortlisted plays will be performed and judge before a live audience in Paris sometime before Christmas.
As for those of you who did not make the longlist, I have written feedback for more than fifty of the entrants. I will be sending it out as soon as possible.
Thank you so much to everyone who took part, and keep writing!
A RomCom in Space – easy, right?
Dumped, my new radio play, was released last week. In this article I’m going to talk about some of the things I like and don’t like about what I wrote, and some of the techniques I used to make a romantic comedy on an exploding spaceship hold together (all of which you are welcome to steal.) But first, if you haven’t listened to the play, now is a good time – because the article contains spoilers!
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Congratulations on winning the Little Wonder Radio Play Competition 2018! How do you feel? What was the biggest thing you learned?
Thank you – it’s been very exciting! The winner was announced on New Year’s Eve, so a positive ending to 2018. A big lesson in this process is the importance of finding the right medium for a story. DRIVERLESS was inspired by an exhibition about future technology at the V&A Museum where I spent a long time (probably too long!) in a driverless car simulator. I knew there was a story to be told and my first thought was to write it as a stage play for a Twilight Zone inspired evening. However cars on stage are usually portrayed with actors just plonked on chairs, which rarely really works. When I heard about the Little Wonder Radio Competition I adapted the draft stage piece for the radio which felt like its natural home.
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Our first radio play competition for 2019 is now live and accepting entries until the end of May. This competition is aimed at helping two groups who often find it difficult to get feedback and support: writers of colour and writers with disabilities or long-term illness. We are looking for:
- A radio script for a full cast audio drama between 1600 and 2000 words (10 to 15 minutes).
- Requiring no more than four actors. No children please!
- In English, although writers can be from anywhere in the world.
- Written solo or in a group, but only one entry per person/group.
Full details and the means to enter can be found here:
https://www.aboutwriting.org/little-wonder-breaking-boundaries-radio-play-competition-2019/
And are summarised on the BBC writers room website here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/writersroom/opportunities/little-wonder
The competition is free to enter and at no point will we ask you for money. We no longer offer recording and publication of your work as a prize for the play, because we don’t want anyone to feel that taking part is a form of unpaid work. However, we will talk to members of the shortlist and a few other pieces we like about potential recording opportunities. You can hear last years winning play, Driveless by Annie Fox, here:
Don’t feel left out if you don’t meet the criteria for this competition – we’ll be running a general access competition later his year. And do please read all the instructions before submitting. We’ll be putting up some details about the judges soon, as well as an interview with Annie Fox about what it was like to take part in a Little Wonder competition.
Good luck, and we look forward to reading your plays! Oh, and don’t forget to subscribe so you can keep up to date with the latest news!
