For all of you OTR noir listeners, this should come as no surprise. Radio drama noir and film noir are not the same beast. And that stems from each being completely different styles of storytelling. But as I am met with more and more new audio drama creators trying to do “1940s/50s detective noir,” I recognize that they are not familiar with OTR, but only film. And, thus, make huge mistakes in their attempts to emulate the genre. So I thought I’d discuss the main pitfall I run across as I listen to these new noir shows.
MONOLOGUES
Functional vs. Inner-monologue
The radio “audio-only” detective noir has “functional” monologues. Not all the time, it depends on the show. These monologues are transitions to move the story forward. Think about the format. The shows were half an hour, with roughly twenty-three or so minutes of content (in order to leave room for the sponsor). They had a time restraint, so it makes sense that they would use a device to help move through the plot to get to the next important scene.
Film noir has “inner-monologues.” That now cliche idea every spoof utilizes: “She walked into my office, legs up to here, and I knew she meant trouble.” Those monologues are not in the audio-only storytelling format. They are utilized over camera shots heavy with shadow and nuance. These are the poetic descriptions often associated with “noir.” They express the detective’s thoughts in the scenes, rather than progressing the plot.
Unfortunately, every new audio drama writer who wants to write noir seems to only be versed in film noir and not radio noir. But why should that matter? A few reasons.
Too many lazy writers use the inner-monologue device to avoid having to build the actual scene that the characters are in. Rather than using sound effects or conversational dialogue to paint the picture of the scene, new “noir” writers break from the action — for just a line or two — with an inner-monologue so the detective can give the exposition. I fully believe that if you can’t convey to the audience what is happening in the scene through conversational dialogue, then you need to go back to the drawing board and learn to write audio-only fiction content. Because that’s not how the film noir inner-monologues were used, either. With the screen image, no one had to tell the audience that the woman walked into his office. What those inner-monologues conveyed was his reaction to her walking in the office.
Another downfall is how many of these “noir” writers don’t understand that the audience isn’t going to be following along in the script with the show. So while in the script the writer might’ve indicated in some way that this dialogue is “a monologue,” unless in post production some device like music is used to differentiate, listeners are going to get utterly confused. And I have heard those. Where you stop for a second trying to understand if the detective just said that out loud to the other characters or… and by the time your brain catches up, the monologue is over and the detective is back in the scene. Bad writing.
Plus, in audio-only noir, the monologues, while descriptive, aren’t rambling poetry. They are done in the voice of the detective. He might weigh-in on some of his emotions in the moment, but they aren’t line after line of similes, metaphors and long-winded descriptions. The monologues still read like dialogue a real person might say. Not an English major showing off for a girl he wants to impress. That said: “Broadway is My Beat,” I would argue, is the exception. Morton Fine and David Friedkin created monologues for Detective Danny Clover which painted a vivid poetic portrait of the rough streets of New York City in the early 1950s. They used elegant descriptors to contrast the harsh realities. Truly, if any new audio drama writer wants to know how to write beautiful noir monologues, that is the show to immerse yourself in. But those monologues still were functional for transitions. Danny never broke in the middle of a scene for the audience to hear his thoughts.
I guess I stand on this particular soap-box because it upsets me to see so many writers bragging about creating “new noir!” without any background in the original noir. They come to it as know-it-alls who think they’re doing noir, and then perpetuate the mistakes to a whole new set of listeners. So the cycle continues, while OTR is dismissed as “corny” or “cheesy” and only worth spoofing, not listening to. Even though none of them have ever heard any actual episodes.
-Chrisi (aka Madison)
