Object Piece is a radio drama recorded in a dried out lake bed in 1978. It's visceral and compelling, with incredible acting, and it was made by Erik Bauersfeld, one of the great audio dramatists of the late 20th century.

CREDITS FOR “OBJECT PIECE”

WRITER
DIRECTOR/DAK
CHARLES
SOUND DESIGN and ENGINEERING
ADDITIONAL ENGINEERING

Drury Pifer
Erik Bauersfeld
Gale Chugg
Randy Thom
Jim McKee

First we'll hear the story, then we'll learn more about where it came from and how it was made. We'll talk to Randy Thom, whose 50-year career in film sound began with a job recording with Bauersfeld. We also talk with Jim McKee of Earwax Studios, who followed in Randy's footsteps. And we hear from Neil Verma, who teaches audio drama at Northwestern, and uses this story in his classes.

Neil Verma has two books you might enjoy:

⁠Theater of the Mind⁠, a study of how American radio drama from the 1930s–50s developed its own narrative grammar through voice, space, sound, and psychology to create an intimate, interior “theater” uniquely suited to the medium.

⁠Narrative Podcasting in an Age of Obsession⁠, an examination of how contemporary narrative podcasts, from true crime to fiction to documentary hybrids, use style, structure, intimacy, and serialized attention-engineering to shape our current culture of listening and fixation.