I've just been wandering about the corridors of Broadcasting House and I discovered a figurative piece of paper pinned to the Radio 3 New Commissions figurative door: "What we’re looking for: Classic Plays reinvented for 21st century audio". We know all about the fondness Radio 3 has for revamping the classics, which isn't always what one wants and doesn't always work; so it got me thinking 
When a film company buys the rights to a novel, the novelist generally gives up the right to a say on how the novel will be adapted for the screen. It's then accepted that the novel is one art work, the film is a different one. Which is fine because whatever they do with the film, the book remains to be read as the author intended.
The problem with adapting a classic stage work for radio to make it a 'new' drama, is that the original is seldom available to the general public to see. Is there a conveniently local theatre in the UK currently performing Ibsen's Brand? Unlikely. So if Radio 3 decides to commission a 'new' version it doesn't fill that gap if it provides something different from another playwright's mind.
A new theatre production of Brand can innovate creatively with, say, imaginative staging - not open for an audio-only production. So which is a more valuable service for Radio 3 to provide: a 'straight' production which brings a classic work to a large audience who otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to encounter it, possibly ever? Or a probably short-lived new version destined to be forgotten in a few years? One can read the play, but the play isn't meant to be read whereas a novel is.
When a film company buys the rights to a novel, the novelist generally gives up the right to a say on how the novel will be adapted for the screen. It's then accepted that the novel is one art work, the film is a different one. Which is fine because whatever they do with the film, the book remains to be read as the author intended.
The problem with adapting a classic stage work for radio to make it a 'new' drama, is that the original is seldom available to the general public to see. Is there a conveniently local theatre in the UK currently performing Ibsen's Brand? Unlikely. So if Radio 3 decides to commission a 'new' version it doesn't fill that gap if it provides something different from another playwright's mind.
A new theatre production of Brand can innovate creatively with, say, imaginative staging - not open for an audio-only production. So which is a more valuable service for Radio 3 to provide: a 'straight' production which brings a classic work to a large audience who otherwise wouldn't have an opportunity to encounter it, possibly ever? Or a probably short-lived new version destined to be forgotten in a few years? One can read the play, but the play isn't meant to be read whereas a novel is.
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