Building a Jaw-Dropping Cliffhanger... Every Episode
This is all about keeping constant tension.
"When I wanted to rip off Serial for my podcast series My Only Story, optimistically I googled ‘narrative structure serial podcast’," says Deon Wiggett, the creator and writer of podcasts My Only Story and Exodus. He found many interesting discussions, but not really what he was looking for. "I wanted a simple, three-word answer that would tell me how Serial is written. My quest proved much harder than I had imagined."
Tip 1# - How to keep constant tension
Eventually, Deon did find a three-word answer. "Suddenly, the structure became obvious. Serial is written like television drama," he says. Nothing in journalism or advertising (his two disciplines) had taught him to write a television drama. "It’s a surprisingly niche thing," he says.
"So I started to read books that instructed me to write in scenes. These scenes I should arrange into acts so that the drama peaks every 15 minutes, at the climax of the act," he says. And the acts should be arranged so they get increasingly dramatic up to the cliffhanger. He's busy working on a second series of My Only Story and he says maintaining that line of tension through structure is still the toughest part.
"As writers, all we really care about is getting people to keep listening. That’s why we must care so deeply about structure. When it’s perfect, it’s invisible. The listener remains narratively captured because the story just seems to flow," he says. Stories, in reality, do not flow. "We are the masochists who must make them," he says.
• Deon Wiggett is the creator and writer of the podcasts My Only Story and Exodus.
LISTEN NOW: Deon Wiggett's deeply personal and impactful podcast series My Only Story.
Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify
Tip 2# - Your Emotions Matter
I did an embarrassing number of takes when recording voiceover while producing Alibi: Laduma High. That’s because it takes time to learn how your voice best expresses different emotions for an audience.
You want to sound like you are talking intimately to a handful of people rather than a few dozen. Project the emotion you want your audience to feel given the story’s development at that moment. Think of a Spielberg film. There is always a reaction shot from a character that manifests what the viewer should be feeling — you know, like in ET, the awe on the face of the little boy is in the center of the frame when we may otherwise be unsure of how to feel about the alien who has just appeared.
Moments of emotion must be curated by your voice. It’s how you hold your listener’s attention while they drive, walk around and do the washing-up.
When I started recording voiceover I had a tendency to go shrill and almost laugh when there was any emotional beat. My instinct was to play up the comedy of the situation. Not only was this dismissive of what should be a heartfelt moment, but it was confusing. Listeners thought that they missed a joke. They didn’t understand that I laugh easily and nervously at everything. But I managed to adjust this at least while doing voiceover.
This was adapted from an article I originally wrote for GIJN.
Alibi: Laduma High has been recently nominated in the Podcast category at The South African Radio Awards.
All the best,
Paul
If you'd like to chat more about podcasts you can just hit "reply" to this letter. I'd love to hear from you.
LISTEN NOW: Alibi: Laduma High is the investigation into the assassination of a high school teacher. She was gunned down while teaching her class.
Listen on Apple Podcasts | Spotify