Standing in front of a microphone, voice actor Phil Cruz pretends to wield an amulet to defeat the Devil for the latest installment of one of the Philippines’ few surviving radio dramas.
Cruz is part of a small team of voice actors and technicians producing shows that are broadcast in Tagalog by DZRH, one of the oldest radio stations in the country.
Radio dramas were the main source of entertainment for Filipino families after World War 2, just like the rest of the world, but their popularity faded with the rise of television, social media, and video livestreaming.
Cruz followed his father into voice acting in 1979, back when DZRH aired 18 drama programs over nine hours a day in stiff competition with other broadcasters.
Now it produces seven.
Among them is “Night of Horror,” the station’s oldest series that has been terrifying audiences for 66 years with tales of devils, vampires and murderous skeletons.
Love, family, and poverty are among the themes tackled in other long-running dramas, such as “You’re My Only Life” and “This Is Our Life.”
Gerry Mutia produces sound effects that help listeners visualize the stories and, while many can be computer-generated, he still prefers “the old way.”
Mutia keeps a box of objects in the studio to simulate sounds: coconut shells for galloping horses, a door bolt for the cocking of a gun, and stamping his feet in a box of leaves for footsteps in a forest.
He even uses his own voice for a cat’s meow.
“The computer can replicate the sound of a slap but it is more realistic doing it the old way,” said Mutia, demonstrating by striking together a pair of old rubber shoe soles.
‘Our only entertainment’
The beauty of radio was that it reached “everyone, even the poor,” said Rosanna Villegas, 63. She, like Cruz, followed her radio actor father into the industry.
“It’s a means of entertainment, which comes on top of what they watch on TV or the movies,” she said.
“They (fans) tell us their stress disappears.” Among the DZRH team’s loyal fans is Henry Amadure, who lives by himself on a farm about 60 kilometers (40 miles) south of Manila.
Amadure listens to “The Promise of Tomorrow” on a small radio that he always takes with him to the field as he slashes weeds around taro plants. The series is about a friendship between a poor university student and his rich classmate.