ENMU offers insider look at radio show production

STAFF WRITER

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Eastern New Mexico University is giving the community a chance to look behind the scenes of how a radio play is produced in real-time.

"Committed" is a radio play written and directed by ENMU Professor James Lee. Admission is free for the play, which will be performed live at 7 p.m. today and Friday at the KENW Broadcast Center.

Carmen Runyan, one of the assistant producers of the play, said the Communications Department is trying to bring back the classic element to radio plays.

link Staff photo: Jackie Johnson

Actors from the radio play "Committed" rehearse in the Eastern New Mexico University Communications Building on Wednesday afternoon. The play is free admission and open to the community today and Friday at 7 p.m.

"In the old days before television, people would gather around the radio and without being able to visually watch people act, they would hear the sound effects and the voices, so it was more based on imagination," she said.

Runyan said the audience will be invited to come into one of the studios at the broadcast center and watch the performers read their lines and see how the sound effects are produced. The performance will be recorded and later put online and available in CD format.

"It's a very interesting art form," she said. "It's not something that we get the chance to see very often or something we would get to see done anywhere else. Usually we only get to hear it on the radio after it is completed."

Runyan described the play as a political satire and said is about a group of people that are trying to change the nation.

"It's focused on what most people question about the government, and this group is discussing what the problems are, why they haven't been addressed and how can they be solved," she said.

The play has been in production for about three weeks, according to producer, assistant director and announcer of the play Sara Krafft.

Runyan said there have been three or four rehearsals in session every week for preparation, which Krafft said goes by a little more quickly for this kind of play, because they don't have costumes or sets, and they don't have to fully memorize lines.

Even though the actors will be reading from their scripts, Runyan said that doesn't mean they won’t be acting.

"A lot of the nuances that come with speaking are also in movement, so you will be seeing the acting through the reading and it's really big and expressive," she said.

The cast is composed of a mix of community members, ENMU faculty, staff, alumni and students, which includes Krafft, Matt Hillsman, Kasha Saltz, Amie Griffith, Craig Costley, Kirsten Peterson-Barber, Zak Paneral and Wayne Head.

ENMU alumni Craig Costley, who will be playing the attorney general, said it's been about 25 years since he's participated in an ENMU project, and he is having a lot of fun.

Kasha Saltz, a freshman at ENMU, will be playing the secretary of state.

"This is new to me, but I'm really enjoying it," she said. "It's been a positive learning experience."