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Podcast: RadioAmerica - Old Time Radio
Episode:

orson wells War of the world
Category: Arts
Duration: 00:17:42
Publish Date: 2007-03-10 21:09:15
Description: H. G. Wells' novel is about a Martian invasion of Earth at the end of the 19th century, as related by a narrator seeing the events unfold in England. The radioplay's story was adapted by and written primarily by Howard Koch, with input from Orson Welles and the staff of CBS's Mercury Theatre On The Air. The action was transferred to contemporary Grover's Mill, a community that has since been annexed by West Windsor Township, New Jersey, and the radio program's format was meant to simulate a live newscast of developing events. To this end, Welles even played recordings of Herbert Morrison's radio reports of the Hindenburg disaster to actor Frank Readick and the rest of the cast to demonstrate the mood he wanted. About half of the 55-minute play was a contemporary retelling of the events of the novel, presented as a series of news bulletins in documentary style. This approach to radio drama was not exactly new. Fr. Ronald Knox's satirical "newscast" of a riot overtaking London over the British Broadcasting Company in 1926 had taken a similar approach (and created much the same effect upon its audience). Welles had himself also been influenced by the Archibald MacLeish dramas The Fall of The City and Air Raid, the former using Welles himself in the role of a live radio news reporter. But the approach had never been done before with as much continued verisimilitude[1]), and the innovative format has been cited as a key factor in the confusion that would follow.
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