Radio 4 is pulling the plug on its Friday Play

Les Benedictus has written a very comprehensive article on this but also going into the background of radio drama, past, present and future. The article is well worth a read.

The reason, of course, is cost. At £23,000 per hour, the BBC spends on radio drama about one 40th of what it might pay for an hour of television. Hampton's White Chameleon is a marquee production for Radio 4, and yet there are no White Chameleon baseball caps, no Dionysian trailers, no egos being massaged (no time). Gather its entire cast and crew together, and you would not have enough people for a football match. This, BBC bosses argue, is why Radio 4's main evening slot, the Friday Play, will cease to exist from next year; it was either save there, where the audience is smallest, or cut everything else beyond the bone.

It is a shame that Radio 4 are having to drop The Friday Play but there is still a lo of drama on Radio 4 with The Afternoon Play, the Womans Hour serial, etc.

Les goes on to look at the future especially on line of radio drama....

Is there anybody out there? Radio drama beyond the BBC
The BBC has such a grip on radio drama in Britain that it's easy to forget about the alternatives.
Ireland's RTÉ still podcasts a Sunday Playhouse each week – go to rte.ie/radio1/drama. If you speak French you may also find something worthwhile on Arte Radio (arteradio.com).
There is a rich online supply of radio plays from the 1940s and 1950s. You can find mystery plays from Orson Welles at cjkell.squarespace.com; classic drama at classicdrama.libsyn.com; and kids' entertainment featuring Space Heroes at spaceheroes.libsyn.com.
By far the busiest group of original audio dramatists, however, are the small-scale podcasters. For the most part, this means science fiction, fantasy and mystery stories – try the Pendant Productions website (pendantaudio.com). For a polished zombie drama podcast go to zombiepodcast.com. Mystery stories can be heard at olinemysteries.com and wormwoodshow.com. One well-regarded (and British) ghost story series from 2006 is still available at paranormalists.co.uk.
You can find well-packaged guides to what else is out there at audiodramareview.blogspot.com and radiodramarevival.com. And it's all free.

Yes it may be free but how are actors, writers, technicians and producers going to pay the mortgage?