Vintage Voices produced by GRAPA to grace local airwaves

The Vintage Voices project will see a series of radio plays released on a weekly basis both online and through 2MIA Community Radio.

"We wanted to come up with a production that we could do remotely and that our audience could engage with remotely," producer Bonnie Owen said.

"I thought the radio plays would offer a really lovely sense of nostalgia to a lot of people and it would be unique."

GRAPA placed a casting call online for aspiring voice actors in the local community and received an overwhelming response, nine auditions in the first 24 hours.

Griffith locals jumped at the chance to get involved with the community theatre group, after their award-winning A Midsummer Night's Dream production in November last year.

The scripts for this year's radio plays have been written by playwright Lisa Semmler, centring around the history of Griffith and paying homage to a time well before the modern era.

"I was approached by these guys to write plays for this project, which is exciting because I'm a local," Ms Semmler said.

"It's been really fun creating all the different stories, now they get to come to life."

The project will begin recordings in September, with the first release scheduled for October.

There are currently seven plays which have been written, but GRAPA may introduce more based on community interest.

"It's great that we had someone like Lisa who could write for what we needed, and it's great that we've got someone like Bonnie who is so entrenched in the history of Griffith," president Oumi Karenga-Hewitt said.

"We were just really excited to do something and this seemed like the perfect way to go about it."

Vintage Voices will be available online at Griffith Regional Association of the Performing Arts, Pioneer Park Museum and via 2MIA FM Community Radio.

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