Soaptacular

Your foreign correspondent here with the first of two new (to me) discoveries from DramaPod this week.

Now... Soap Operas are really not my thing. Never have been. But as other genres have waxed and waned over the years, passing in and out of fashion, the soap audience has never let go of their "stories", and I don't expect they ever will. That must be what has kept Scripts and Scruples going, because they have a Cal Ripkin-like streak going that should make everyone producing or consuming Audio Drama sit up and say "Whaaaaaaaaa-?!"

It's pretty standard soap opera fare; the lives and loves of an extraordinarily troubled group of New Yorkers, set to a throbbing piano underscore. No private eyes, superheroes or space aliens. So... Not my thing. But here's the mind-bogglingly impressive part: Yesterday's podcast was episode Seven Hundred and Three. And by the time I finish posting this there will probably be a new one up. Seriously. They write, produce and release a five to eight minute podcast soap episode five days a week, monday to friday. With a week off for Christmas. And they're in their fourth season. All of the season four episodes are available on the site, with scripts available going all the way back to episode one on August 25th, 2003. (Think about what you were doing back then. Had you even heard of Podcasting yet? I think it was mostly done with ball bearings and steam turbines back then.)

No one is going to mistake any of it for Shakespeare... but it's a soap opera for pete's sake... it's supposed to be like that. And this isn't a parody, it's an honest to goodness soap. Parody is easy - actually working in a genre and making it work isn't. Maybe the greatest challenge in building a podcast audience is keeping them. Without massive (or any) advertising budgets it's hard to keep your folks coming back if the schedule is erratic, or there are off-seasons with months and months between episodes. Wether you love the genre or not, you have to admire the work ethic and the dedication. And given the number of fan pages they're linked to - my guess is that loads of listeners are already addicted.