legends · 4 min read ·
Take 14
A radio play's recording notes show a voice that was not in the cast, and a final take that is not the actors'.
**Radio Play — "The Lamplighter's Round" (60 min). Script, rev. 3. Producer: Anna Pryce. Director: Marcus Hale.**
**Cast.** NARRATOR (Mr. Evans). LAMPLIGHTER (Mr. Grey). MRS. TRELAWNY (Ms. Doyle). MAN IN THE ROAD (Mr. Okoro).
· · ·
**Scene 4 (script)**
**SFX:** Rain. Footsteps on cobbles.
**NARRATOR:** The lamplighter climbed the last of the hill. Behind him, the gas lamps burned a pale gold. Ahead, the road was dark.
**LAMPLIGHTER:** One more, then home. (Pause.) Hello? Who's there?
**SFX:** A step. A pause.
**MAN IN THE ROAD:** Only me. Only the last of them.
**LAMPLIGHTER:** The last of what?
**SFX:** Rain. Fade.
· · ·
**Director's recording notes (Studio B, 12 October)**
Take 1–3: fine. Mr. Grey is giving a wonderful performance. Mr. Okoro slightly mushy in the last line. Take 4: good. Take 5: noise on the SFX track. Take 6: good. Take 7: kept.
Playback of take 7 revealed an unscripted line after "Only the last of them." In the gap after Mr. Okoro's line and before the fade, a voice says, very close to the microphone, in a calm tone: *"And then the next."*
We do not have an actor with this voice. We have checked.
· · ·
**Director's recording notes (13 October)**
Re-recorded scene 4. Take 9: clean. Take 10: clean. Take 11: Mr. Okoro heard a voice whisper to him at his shoulder during the line. He broke off. We continued. Take 12: clean. Take 13: Mr. Grey's line, "Hello? Who's there?" was answered, in the studio, before Mr. Okoro spoke, by a quiet voice in the dead room. "Only me."
Take 14: perfect. Kept. No stray lines.
· · ·
**Producer's note (A. Pryce, 14 October)**
I listened to take 14 on headphones. It is perfect. Each performance has the sheen of a final take. But I noticed something in the room tone. Under the dialogue there is a faint, steady sound, a kind of soft pressure, like someone breathing very slowly through the nose. It is in every take from number 7 onward. It increases in each, by about a decibel.
I played the room tone to the engineer. He said: "That's not a breath. It's a pulse."
· · ·
**Director's recording notes (15 October, scene 12)**
Scene 12 is the climax. The lamplighter comes to the end of the hill and finds the last lamp unlit. He reaches up to light it. The script says: **SFX: A match. A flare. The sound of gas catching.** Then: **LAMPLIGHTER: There. Now they can see.**
Take 3 had Mr. Grey's line. But the match was not ours. In the gap after the SFX, the sound of a match being struck was heard from the far corner of the studio, followed by a soft rush of flame. All five of us heard it. The studio monitor shows a spike at 14 kHz, as from a real lighter.
The studio was dark except for the red recording light. When we turned on the working lights the corner was empty. But the air smelled of gas.
· · ·
**Producer's note (A. Pryce, 16 October)**
We broadcast on Friday. The reviews were kind. The *Gazette* called the piece "uncannily convincing." Several listeners wrote to say that at the end of the play, as the music faded, they heard a man's voice in their own room say, "Now they can see." One woman said the voice was her husband's.
I went back to the master. The final minute is not what we recorded. After the lamplighter's last line there is a long pause with rain, and then another voice, which says: *"Thank you. That's the whole round. Lamps lit. Lights out."*
The voice is Mr. Grey's. He has not recorded it. He says he has never said it.
· · ·
**Director's notes (final, M. Hale, 30 October)**
The radio play has been withdrawn from the archive. The master tape has been transferred to the broadcaster's vault, with a note: *Do not play. Do not edit.* The studio has been closed for refurbishment. The cast have gone home.
On the last night I stayed behind in Studio B, to collect the scripts. The room was dark. I stood in the middle of it with my torch. The red recording light came on by itself. A voice said, clearly, from the booth: **"Take fifteen."**
I did not reply. After a moment the voice said, in a different tone, kindly: **"And the lamplighter's cue is, Marcus: the next one is yours."**
I turned off the torch. On the monitor a meter began to rise.