Category: Radio - Dan Fiorella: Writer @ large

Dan Fiorella

Barely Home Companion - New Year’s Noise Makers (Dec. '05)

12/27/2024

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

Don't recall much about this sketch, but upon reading it, it's pretty cute. I stared going for a SFX sketch, which I liked to do because a) it's radio [duh], b) it was a recurring bit for the show and c) I hoped the SFX guy might like it and try to push for it to get more air time. I noticed I got a Walmart joke in there, with the proto-War on Christmas the right would rant about even though it was corporate America that practiced the generic "Happy Holidays" so they wouldn't have to order different signs every week from autumn to year's end.

But it starts as a SFX bit then slides into the absurd, which works then caps it all for with a salute to noise makers. Again, I think PHC missed a bet here not using it, but that was par for the course in the mid-naughts for me. Enjoy the read and happy New Year's!

New Year’s Noise Makers

Barely Home Companion - Clyde Wilson: Christmas Daredevil (Dec. '05)

12/20/2024

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

This is cute little bit that I do remember writing. I took the idea of the last-minute shopper (based on people I know) and turned it into character who you would follow on reality TV. Or in this case, reality radio. I followed the typical "another episode" format the show was so fond of. I strung together some standard "last minute shopper" conceits. I even made a "Tree Grows in Brooklyn" reference. I worked in a smoking outside joke and I written for something else. And it had some heft to it. A lot of my sketches were shrinking in length. I thought it was a a sure-fire idea for PHC. It wasn't.

Clyde Wilson: Christmas Daredevil

Barely Home Companion - A Holiday Carol (Dec. '05)

12/6/2024

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

Before woke became woke, there were the rumblings of the annual "War on Christmas" nonsense. I decided to jump aboard although, now reading this all these years later, I'm not sure whose case I was making. Except mocking commercialism. That was always a thing. But people were claiming that we weren't being allowed to say "Merry Christmas" by liberals. Their proof? Big retail companies were using the phrase "Happy Holidays," which allowed them to put up their holiday decorations early and keep them up longer without having to spend extra to swap them out. Forced to acknowledge that their stores operate in a multi-cultural society and wanting to welcome as many customers as possible, corporations started to be more generic about their wintertime greetings. And this angered (and still angers) people who want to be the center of attention and won't share the cultural spotlight.

Couched as a ad for an upcoming NPR special (as PHC often used), it's a look at Dicken's tale but without the word Christmas. I actually named Walmart, which at the time was dictating retail rules, setting up deals with China for products and underselling everyone thanks to it. So dealing with a communistic, atheistic dictatorship was really working for them. And proto-MAGA (then the Tea Party) loved them for it...to a point.

The piece didn't get used; it's all attitude and no real jokes, so I get it. Anyway, Season's Greetings, everyone!

A Holiday Carol

On the Radio - The Nick Files: Author in the First

5/6/2024

The Florida Radio Project just posted their production of my script "The Nick Files: Author in the First." They did a great book with this adaption of my book (which you can buy here).

What happens when a mystery writer blows into town and the bodies start piling up? Nick Flebber has to throw the book at the killer! Check it out!

The Radio Theatre Project · The Nick Files Author In The First written by Dan Fiorella

Barely Home Companion-Coma Spa (June 02)

6/17/2022

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

This is one of those PHC rejected scripts that found a hope eventually. A goofy idea I had for a commercial parody that I put together. PHC passed, but I held on to it to submit to other venues and it finally got picked by All-Star Radio comedy. I've posted the audio below the script.

Coma Spa

2021 Marion Thauer Brown Audio Drama Scriptwriting Competition

7/9/2021

It's been announced that my radio script, "Cupid is As Cupid Does" was the winner in this year's MTB Audio Drama Scriptwriting Competition, which celebrates exciting aural storytelling!

The script is an adaptation of my short story that was published in "Love and Other Distractions: An Anthology by 14 Hollywood Writers." You can pick up a copy today. All proceeds go to charity!

The story is a sequel of sorts to my film script "Lost Claus." I've been working on several episodes of a project I call "The Nick Files," where the detective character, Nick Flebber, is called in to solved other odd-ball cases. I started adapting them to radio, getting the idea from the time I took the film script and knocked it down to a 15-minute sketch for Prairie Home Companion. They didn't produce it, but I sent it around to various radio groups and it's been produced. I followed that up with an adaptation of my book "Author in the First" and then found a home with the Lakes Area Radio Theater. They have produced "Never Say Never Neverland Again," "The Leprechaun Job" and "Spoiler Alert" but I'm still waiting for them to post the shows online.

Wow, this post went off in a lot of directions at once.

Barely Home Companion - Radio Sight Gags (July 2002)

7/9/2021

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

PHC was winding down for the 2001-02 season with their big Season Finale. I always would try to put something together that was bigger and broader to make a year-end splash. The show announced it would begin live-streaming the show on the internet and that triggered this idea, a sketch about radio sight gags.

It's something I've alluded to before, with things like "radio magicians" and such but the idea of online video made this a skit that had to be submitted. I checked my journals from this time and I was pretty distraught, trying to finish up a screenplay, trying to get a paying gig as I watched Cracked magazine start to implode. The day job was a nightmare and the family kept me busy. I noted in my notebook how I had an idea, then forgot it, then remembered it as I was writing I forgot it. I was upbeat about the idea and thought it was funny and how I had to add a mime to the end to punch it up. Again, a brief bit of silliness and sound effects that I would have bet PHC would love! I would have lost that bet. The show aired for the last time that season without me. And again, a very specific sketch that couldn't be submitted elsewhere

Radio Sight Gags

Barely Home Companion - Kettering, Ohio (June 2002)

6/25/2021

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

This is one of those pieces I had totally forgotten about. PHC was on one of its road trips and was doing a show from Kettering, Ohio, which usually meant they liked to do some bits about the town they're in and it's history. I had become fond of these times because they forced me out of my box. As noted, I was running on creative fumes, submitting old material to the show. So, I did some internetting about Kettering, Ohio and wrote up a lecture about the town.

I have to say, rereading it now, it's actually pretty good. I present the facts in a goofy fashion and had fun with the topic and the man the town is named after. Naturally, I was disappointed it wasn't used, more so because there was absolutely nowhere else to send it. That was the thing with PHC, you wanted to write in its voice but that made it harder to submit rejected material elsewhere. It was something I always did with the more neutral or generic comedy sketches, but these type of things were dead in the water. Well, here it is for the first time anywhere; a celebration of Kettering, Ohio on its 50th anniversary:

Kettering, Ohio

Barely Home Companion - NPR News (March 2002)

3/15/2021

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Home Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

This is a heavily recycled bit. I had come up with a couple of sketches and pitched them as a series of black-outs for an ABC comedy pilot called "Where's the Party," a sketch-comedy-music-talk show. I honestly don't remember how the idea came about, but there were a series of sketches about a news team that was so desperate to be the first on the air that they caused the problems. It got produced in 1991. The bits got scaled back a bit (as you'll see in the video below) for budget reasons. But the radio version went all out again, as originally written. So I pulled them out and submitted it to PHC. They didn't go for it. Years later (I think 2010) I submitted to the All Star production Network and they did do two of the full sketches. I'm including them below, as well. So, again, first rule of comedy writing, Never Throw Anything Out.

NPR News

Barely Home Companion - A Charlie Brown Mid-Life Christmas (12/01)

12/13/2020

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

This was a strange run for me. They used some of my writing during the month of December, but never quite in the context I wrote it. I had this piece called A Charlie Brown Mid-Life Christmas which I adapted for radio and submitted. Granted, it faced the hurdle of being too TV, but, it's Peanuts, for heaven's sake and a classic Christmas special. Anyway, they lifted one line from my piece and used it in one of his Barry Minot sketches, a running bit he did that sounded like many of the other running bits he did. I got an "Additional material" credit for my efforts:

© Garrison Keillor 2001, additional material by Dan Fiorella

I posted my version of the sketch a couple of Christmases ago (the link is above) as a "Skit Happens" entry. The broadcast version is below, with the PHC page here. They saved my line for the big ending.

Dan Fiorella · PHC - Barry Minot Christmas

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