War of the Worlds (radio)

: The War of the Worlds, a radio adaptation by Orson Welles based upon H. G. Wells' classic novel, was performed by Mercury Theatre on the Air as a Halloween special on October 30, 1938. The live broadcast reportedly frightened many listeners into believing that an actual Martian invasion was in progress. Welles' adaptation is possibly the most successful radio dramatic production in history. It was one of the Radio Project's first studies.

Broadcast

Radio Project 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 story was adapted by and written primarily by Howard Koch, with input from Welles and the staff of CBS's Mercury Theatre On The Air. The action was transferred to contemporary Grover's Mill, a section of West Windsor Township, New Jersey, and the radio program's format was meant to simulate a live newscast. To this end, Welles even played recordings of the radio reports of the famous Hindenburg disaster to the cast to demonstrate the mood he wanted. Approximately one-half of the 50-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 had never been done before (at least not with as much continued verisimilitude), and the innovative format has been cited as a key factor in the confusion that would follow. The program started with an introduction and a short introduction to the intentions of the aliens, and noted that the adaptation was set in 1939. The program continued as an apparently ordinary music show, only occasionally interrupted by news flashes. Initially, the news is of strange explosions sighted on Mars. The news reports grew more frequent and increasingly ominous after a "meteorite"--later revealed as a Martian rocket capsule--lands in New Jersey. A crowd gathers at the landing site, and the events are related by reporter "Carl Philips" up until the Martians incinerate curious onlookers with their "heat rays". (Later surveys indicate that many listeners heard only this portion of the show before contacting neighbors or family to inquire about the broadcast. Many of these people contacted others, in turn; leading to rumours and later confusion.) More Martian ships land, and then proceed to wreak havoc throughout the United States, destroying bridges and railroads, and spraying a poison gas into the air. An unnamed Secretary of the Interior advises the nation on the growing conflict. (The "Secretary" was originally intended to be a portrayal of then-President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but CBS insisted this detail, among others, be changed. The "Secretary" did, however, end up sounding very much like Roosevelt as the result of directions given to actor Kenny Delmar by Welles.) Military forces attack the Martians, but are unable to fight them off. People flee or gather in churches to pray as the Martians' machines head towards New York City, spraying poison gas in the air. This section ends famously: a news reporter atop a large building narrates as events unfold, then he too collapses from the poison gas, and a radio operator is heard desperately calling out "2X2L calling CQ… Isn't there anyone on the air? Isn't there anyone on the air? Isn't there… anyone?" The less famous last portion of the broadcast was a monologue and dialogue featuring Welles, portraying "noted astronomer" Professor Richard Peirson, who had earlier commented on the strange Martian explosions. The story ends as does the novel, with the Martians falling victim to earthly germs and bacteria. Following the conclusion of the play, Welles breaks character to remind listeners that the play was only a Halloween concoction, the equivalent of dressing up in a sheet and saying "Boo" like a ghost; reportedly, this "disclaimer" was added to the broadcast at the insistence of CBS executives as they became aware of the panic inspired by the program.

Public reaction

Many people missed or ignored the opening credits of the program, and in the atmosphere of growing tension and anxiety in the days leading up to World War II, took it to be an actual news broadcast. Contemporary newspapers reported panic ensued, with people fleeing the area, and others thinking they could smell the poison gas or could see the flashes of the fighting in the distance. Later studies suggested this "panic" was far less widespread than newspaper accounts suggested. However, it remains clear that many people were caught up--to one degree or another--in the confusion that followed. Later studies also indicated that many listeners missed the repeated notices that the broadcast was entirely fictional, partly because the Mercury Theatre (an unsponsored "cultural" program with a relatively small audience) ran opposite the very popular Edgar Bergen show. About twelve minutes into Bergen's program an Opera number began, and many listeners presumably began tuning around the dial. Some listeners happened upon the CBS broadcast at the point the Martians emerge from their spacecraft. Many of these listeners were apparently confused--in fairness, it must be noted that the confusion can not be credited entirely to naivete. Though many of the program's actors voices should have been recognizable from appearances on other radio shows, nothing like the "War of the Worlds" broadcast had ever been attempted in the United States, so listeners were accustomed to accepting news flashes as reliable. In some Northeastern cities people went outside to ask neighbors what was happening (many homes still did not have telephones at this time). As the story was repeated by word of mouth, rumors began to spread, and these rumors caused some limited panic. Contemporary accounts spawned urban legends, many of which persist and have come to be accepted through repetition as fact: Several people reportedly rushed to the "scene" of the events in New Jersey to see if they could catch a glimpse of the unfolding events, including a few astronomers from Princeton University who went looking for the "meteorite" that had supposedly fallen near their school. Some people, who had brought firearms, reportedly mistook a local farmer's water tower for an alien spaceship and shot the tower. Initially Grover's Mill was deserted, but later crowds developed as people rushed to the area. Eventually police were sent to the area to help control the crowds. To people arriving later in the evening, the scene really did look like the events being narrated on the radio broadcast, with panicked crowds and flashing police lights streaming across the masses. Some people called CBS, newspapers or the police in confusion over the realism of the simulated news bulletins. There were instances of panic scattered throughout the US as a result of the broadcast, especially in New York and New Jersey. Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy, who were broadcasting at the same time on NBC, are often credited with "saving the world." It is said many startled listeners were reassured by hearing their familiar tones on a neighboring channel.

Aftermath

In the aftermath of the reported "panic," a public outcry arose, but CBS informed officials that listeners were reminded throughout the broadcast that it was only a performance. Welles and the Mercury Theatre escaped punishment, but not censure, and CBS had to promise never again to use the "we interrupt this program" device for dramatic purposes. A study by the Radio Project discovered that most of the people who panicked assumed Germans - not Martians - had invaded. Other studies have suggested that the extent of the panic was exaggerated by contemporary media. When a meeting between H. G. Wells and Orson Welles was broadcast on Radio KTSA San Antonio on October 28 1940 the former expressed a lack of understanding of the apparent panic and suggested that it was, perhaps, only pretense put on, like the American version of Halloween, for fun. The two men and their radio interviewer joked politely about the matter, though clearly with some embarrassment. KTSA, as a CBS affiliate, had carried the original broadcast.

Popularity

The Los Angeles CBS affiliate radio station, KNX (1070 AM), re-broadcasts the radio program every year on Halloween. A 1975 television film for ABC, The Night That Panicked America, dramatizes the public's panicked reaction to the broadcast, but comes across as a fairly standard disaster movie (albeit one in which the disaster is assumed rather than actual). The script was also updated and broadcast by PBS on the 50th anniversary of the original radio play in 1988. It starred Jason Robards, Steve Allen, Douglas Edwards, Scott Simon and Terry Gross and was nominated for a Grammy Award. Recordings of the broadcast are still available (see old-time radio). Recently, radio show host Glenn Beck did a live version as well in honor of the drama on Halloween. XM Satellite Radio has broadcast a new version in recent years in which Microsoft's Bill Gates is one of the Martians.

Influence

It is sometimes said that the news of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was first received in skepticism by the American public, as a consequence of the radio performance. Amazingly enough, the drama has been rewritten to apply to other locations and rebroadcast, with similar results. A 1944 broadcast in Santiago, Chile caused panic, including mobilization of troops by the governor. A February 12 1949 broadcast in Quito, Ecuador panicked tens of thousands [http://www.swl.net/patepluma/south/ecuador/martians.html]. Some listeners, enraged at the deception, set fire to the radio station and the offices of El Comercio, the capital's leading newspaper, killing twenty people. The property damage was estimated at $350,000. Three officials charged with responsibility for the broadcast were arrested. Because of the panic in the 1930s and 1940s associated with this radio play, TV networks have deemed it necessary to post bulletins to their viewing audience to inform them some TV stories were in fact fictional drama, and not really happening. Disclaimers of this sort were shown during broadcasts of the 1983 television movie Special Bulletin and again during the 1994 telefilm, Without Warning, both of which were dramas disguised as realistic news broadcasts (Without Warning, presenting an alien attack on Earth, acknowledged that it was a tribute to War of the Worlds and was broadcast on CBS TV on the 56th anniversary of the radio broadcast). NBC placed disclaimers in an October 1999 TV movie dramatizing the possible disastrous effects of the Y2K bug even though it was obviously drama and was unlikely to be confused with reality. The radio play's success in updating the story proved so impressionable that many adaptations of The War of the Worlds have done likewise.

Possible influence on Welles

A 2005 BBC report suggested that Welles' idea and style may have been influenced by an earlier 1926 hoax broadcast by Ronald Knox on BBC radio. Knox's broadcast also mixes breathless reporting of a revolution sweeping across London with dance music and sound effects of destruction. Moreover, Knox's broadcast also caused a minor panic among listeners who did not know that the program was fictional.

References in fiction

Michael Crichton's Sphere cites the Orson Welles broadcast as an example of why, in the event of an actual alien arrival, it would be more prudent to anticipate mass panic on the part of humanity than wonder and awe. There has been similar speculation for decades in ufology: that the War of the Worlds broadcast is the reason evidence supporting the reality unidentified flying objects has been suppressed. In the 1984 movie The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, the plot hinges around an alien race of Red Lectroids whose arrival on earth in Grover's Mill, New Jersey instigates Orson Welles' The War of the Worlds radio broadcast, with the aliens hypnotizing Welles and causing him to pass the broadcast off as a drama, when it was indeed factual. Their later cover is that of employees of a fictional defense contracting company called Yoyodyne. The War of the Worlds TV series also incorporated a similar premise. In an episode taking place in Grover's Mill during the 50th anniversary of the broadcast, it is revealed that Orson Welles was hired by the government to orchestrate the broadcast in order to cover up what was a reconnaissance mission by the same aliens who would launch an all-out war 15 years later. The episode is briefly referred to in the film Radio Days by Woody Allen. In the 1990 film Spaced Invaders, a crew of rather dimwitted Martians intercepts radio signals from a rebroadcast of the performance and believes the entire Martian invasion fleet is moving in, leading them to land on Earth and get stranded, setting up the plot of the film. The X-Files episode "War of the Coprophages" parodied the 1938 panic as a small town called "Miller's Grove" (a reference to the Welles program's "Grover's Mill") is seized by fear of an invading horde of tiny robot cockroaches. A Doctor Who audio drama entitled "Invaders from Mars" is set in New York City at the time of the broadcast, with unusual events occurring in the city's underworld which mirror the radio story. The 1992 BBC TV Halloween special Ghostwatch was similar in its shocking displays of a haunted house in North London. A similar realistic-looking "hoax" was a 1977 British science fiction movie entitled Alternative 3 which was presented as a science documentary, though the credits showed a production date of April Fool's Day. To this day, there are many who contend the events documented in Alternative 3 were at least partly factual. A comic book story that crosses over the War of the Worlds story with Superman was published. However, instead of taking place in the period as in the novel, the story is set in 1938. An Adventures in Odyssey episode, Terror From the Skies, is based on and makes many references to The War of the Worlds. Like Orson Welles' broadcast, it features a dramatized radio broadcast that tells about an alien invasion of Earth. In the video game Metal Gear Solid 3, supporting character Para-Medic from Snake's radio frequency gives an amusing retelling of her parents' panic during the radio play.

External links

- [http://ufo.whipnet.org/xdocs/orson.welles/ Orson Welles: War of the Worlds, and the Invasion from Mars]
- [http://www.engl.duq.edu/servus/FirstClass/Stewart102.html The Martian Invasion] describes instances of panic, outcry over the panic and the responses by the FCC and CBS
- [http://www.worldandi.com/newhome/public/2004/january/writerspub.asp The imagination, prognostications, and politics of H. G. Wells]
- [http://www.csicop.org/si/9811/martian.html The Martian Panic Sixty Years Later] from CSICOP
- [http://www.mercurytheatre.info/ The Mercury Theatre Online] With downloadable MP3 of the 1938 broadcast.
- [http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/06/0617_050617_warworlds.html National Geographic]
- [http://members.aol.com/jeff1070/wotw.html Radio Listeners in Panic, Taking War Drama as Fact]
- [http://members.aol.com/jeff1070/script.html "The War of the Worlds" script]
- [http://www.war-ofthe-worlds.co.uk "The War Of The Worlds broadcast in detail"]
- [http://users.skynet.be/bk244875/engels/wotwactivity.pdf Classroom activity: fill in the blanks]
- [http://www.emanuellevy.com/article.php?articleID=264 Once Upon a Time, When Radio Was King...] Orson Welles’ Broadcast of War of the Worlds, by Emanuel Levy
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/the_riot_that_never_was.shtml BBC report on the 1926 Knox riot hoax]
- [http://www.darkhorse.com/zones/wotw/wotw_popup.php?p= Darkhorse comic adaptation] War of the Worlds (radio), The War of the Worlds (radio), The War of the Worlds (radio), The War of the Worlds (radio), The War of the Worlds (radio), The

Radio drama

Radio drama (audio drama), which had its greatest popularity in the United States and in most other countries before the spread of television, depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine the story in her or his "mind's eye". In the television era, some audio drama has been produced and marketed that owes much to radio drama, without ever being broadcast on radio. Among the most famous radio dramas are Under Milk Wood, a 'Play for Voices' by Dylan Thomas, and Orson Welles's 1938 radio version of The War of the Worlds, which convinced large numbers of listeners that an actual invasion from Mars was taking place. Often considered the first radio drama is Danger by Richard Hughes, broadcast by the BBC on 15 January 1924. Radio drama remains popular in much of the world. Many film, stage and TV writers got their start in radio drama, including Tom Stoppard and Caryl Churchill. Stations producing radio drama often commission a large number of scripts. The relatively low cost of producing a radio play enables them to take chances with works by unknown writers. Radio is a good training medium for drama writers as the words written form a much greater part of the finished product; bad lines cannot be obscured with 'stage business'. The lack of visuals also enable fantastical settings and effects to be used in radio plays where the cost would be prohibitive in a visual medium. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was first produced as radio drama, and was not adapted for television until much later, when its popularity would ensure an appropriate return for the high cost of the futuristic setting. On occasion television series can be revived as radio series. For example a long-running but no longer popular television series can be continued as a radio series because the reduced production costs make it cost-effective with a much smaller audience. When an organisation owns both television and radio channels, such as the BBC, the fact that no royalties have to be paid makes this even more attractive. Radio revivals can also use actors reprising their television roles even after decades as they still sound roughly the same. Series that have had this treatment include Doctor Who, Dad's Army and Thunderbirds. Radio dramas can be regularly heard on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (Radio 1), on RTÉ in Ireland, and the BBC's Radio 4, Radio 3, and BBC 7. Radio 4 in particular is noted for its radio drama, with strands such as The Afternoon Play broadcasting hundreds of one-off plays per year, in addition to serials and soap operas such as The Archers. The British commercial station Oneword, though broadcasting mostly book readings, also has some radio plays in instalments. Radio drama can also be found on ACB radio produced by the American Council of the Blind. The networks sometime sell transcripts of their shows on cassette tapes or CDs or make the shows available for listening or downloading over the Internet. Transcription recordings of many pre-television shows have been preserved. They are collected, re-recorded onto audio CDs and/or MP3 files and traded by hobbyists today as old-time radio programs. With 21st-century technology, modern radio drama, also known as audio theater, has begun an exciting new movement. Local radio drama groups such as Crazy Dog Audio Theatre (from Ireland), Texas Radio Theater, and FreeQuincy Radio Theater (from Wisconsin) have kept the spirit of radio drama alive. Audio drama released directly to CD or cassette tape rather than ever being broadcast is a related format to radio drama.

Programs/series

- Perdition City web audio drama @ DaveFilms.US
- Adventures in Odyssey
- Amos 'n' Andy
- The Black Mass
- CBS Radio Mystery Theater
- Dimension X; later X Minus One
- Earplay
- Escape
- The General Mills Radio Adventure Theater; later CBS Radio Adventure Theater
- The Goon Show
- The Green Hornet
- Gunsmoke
- Inner Sanctum
- Jane Arden
- Left Behind
- The Life of Riley
- Lights Out
- The Lone Ranger
- The Lord of the Rings (BBC radio version)
- Lum and Abner
- Lux Radio Theater
- Mercury Theatre On The Air
- The National Radio Theater of Chicago
- The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
- Nick Danger; see also Firesign Theater, Dear Friends
- NPR Playhouse
- Quiet Please
- Sears Radio Theater; later Mutual Radio Theater
- Star Wars (radio)
- The Shadow
- Suspense
- Unshackled

External links

- [http://www.davefilms.us/pc/pc.html Perdition City web audio drama.]
- [http://www.simplyaudiobooks.com Radio drama and Audio Books]
- [http://www.publicradiofan.com/cgi-bin/progsearch.pl?type=literature%2Fdrama&when=listall Radio drama and literature webcast listings]
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/arts/ BBC Radio 4 drama page]
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/speechanddrama/index.shtml BBC Radio 3 drama page]
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbc7/drama/7drama.shtml BBC 7 drama page]
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/programmes/play_of_the_week.shtml BBC World Service Play of the Week] (RealAudio streaming)
- [http://cbc.ca/radiodrama/ CBC radio drama home page]
- [http://www.rte.ie/radio1/drama/ RTÉ Radio 1 Drama]
- [http://www.unknown.nu/mercury/ Mercury Theatre on the Air] website provides all of the famous Orson Welles radio dramas in RealAudio and MP3.
- [http://www.live365.com/index.live The Live365 netstation hub] has many stations that broadcast the old-time radio dramas.
- [http://www.scifi.com/set/ Seeing Ear Theatre] provides MP3 files of contemporary dramas on a science-fiction theme.
- [http://www.angelfire.com/mi/lifespring/page6.html Graymatters Old Time Radio Streaming Links Web Page]
- [http://www.epguides.com/menu/radio.shtml Epguides UK radio show episode guide]
- [http://www.radiosoundstage.com Soundstage] -- radio theatre from WMNF in Tampa
- [http://www.offrampinfo.com Offramp] - improvised radio theatre
- [http://www.pendantaudio.com Pendant Productions] - original, full-cast audio dramas featuring Superman: The Last Son of Krypton, Star Trek: Defiant, James Bond and more to come, including Indiana Jones. Available for free download in .mp3 format.
- Amateur_voice_actingAmateur Voice Acting , groups involved in producing audio drama.
- [http://www.darkerprojects.com/index.html Darker Projects audio dramas - free to download stories from fan fiction versions of Doctor Who, Star Trek, Quantum Leap, etc.] ! Category:Drama ja:ラジオドラマ

Orson Welles

George Orson Welles (May 6, 1915 – October 10, 1985) is considered not only one of the greatest directors of film but also that of the theatre, as well as a fine actor, screenwriter, broadcaster and producer. His first feature film, Citizen Kane (1941) and last Hollywood film Touch of Evil (1958) are both universally acknowledged as important steps in the history of cinema and widely cited by critics as among the best films ever made, while his various productions with the Mercury were considered revolutionary in the theatrical world.

Early career

Welles was born in 1915 in Kenosha, Wisconsin. He had an unusual childhood, being somewhat of a prodigy, and his personal relationships suffered as a result. His mother died when he was nine, and his father, Richard Head Welles, receded into the past, a drunkard. Kenosha, Wisconsin Welles made his first plays while at the Todd School for Boys in Woodstock, Illinois and was brought under the guidance of the principal, Roger Hill, who became a surrogate father to Welles. The sometimes seen work Hearts of Age was made there while he was a student and also stars his first wife, Virginia Nicholson. He later made his stage debut at the famous Gate Theatre in Dublin, Ireland in 1931 when he talked himself onto the stage and appeared in small supporting roles, and by 1934 was a radio director/actor in the United States, working with some of the cast that later became the Mercury Theatre. In that year, he married the actress and socialite Virginia Nicholson. Welles drew a great deal of attention in 1937 with a production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar set in Fascist Italy and a voodoo-themed version of Macbeth featuring a primarily African American cast. Shortly afterward, he and producer John Houseman founded the Mercury Theatre company after they worked together on The Cradle Will Rock. The Cradle Will Rock Welles began playing The Shadow in late 1937; his deep voice suited the role well. In the summer of 1938, Welles and the Mercury Theatre began weekly broadcasts of short radio plays based on classic or popular literary works. Their October 30 broadcast of that year was an adaptation of The War of the Worlds. This brought Welles his first public notoriety on a national level—the program created panic among some listeners who found it completely convincing. Welles's adaptation of H. G. Wells's classic novel simulated a news broadcast, cutting into a routine dance music program to describe the landing of Martian spacecraft in Grover's Mill, New Jersey. The innovative broadcast was realistic enough to frighten many in the audience into believing that an actual Martian invasion was in progress. Recordings of the broadcast are still available (see old-time radio and also the UK Region 2 DVD of Citizen Kane). The publicity that resulted from this led to the offer of a three-picture Hollywood contract from RKO.

Welles in Hollywood

Welles toyed with various ideas for his first project for RKO, settling briefly on an adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness before ultimately rejecting it. RKOs budget projections made it impractical. In a display of his avant garde sensibility, Welles planned to film the action entirely from the protagonist's point of view. With his initial ideas bearing no fruit, Welles finally found a suitable project in an idea suggested by screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz. Initially called American, it would eventually become Welles' first feature film, Citizen Kane (1941). 1941 Welles was once again the centre of controversy with Citizen Kane. The gossip writer Louella Parsons convinced the yellow-press magnate, William Randolph Hearst, that he was the basis for Kane, with the result that Hearst's media empire boycotted the film. On its release, this event overshadowed the film's radical formal innovations. Welles is said to have sardonically remarked, concerning Hearst's attitude, that if he were to do a movie about the journalism magnate, the fact would be more grand and shockingly unbelievable than the fiction. This possibly apocryphal quote is uttered by Liev Schreiber (as Welles) in the 1999 TV movie RKO 281. Welles' second film for RKO was the more traditional The Magnificent Ambersons, adapted from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Booth Tarkington, and on which RKO executives hoped to make back the money lost by Citizen Kanes relative commercial failure. Simultaneously, Welles worked with his Mercury Theatre fellows on a spy thriller, Journey Into Fear, which he co-wrote with Joseph Cotten. In addition to acting in the film, Welles was also a producer. Direction was credited solely to Norman Foster, but the film contains several expressionistic sequences indicating input by Welles. Welles denied having directed the film, but the visual style is very similar to his credited works. Whatever the case, Welles played a major role in its production, but he expressed disappointment at the finished product. During the production of Ambersons, Welles was asked to make a documentary film about South America on behalf of the U. S. Government. Welles left the United States to begin shooting this documentary after putting together the first rough cut of The Magnificent Ambersons, on the understanding that further editing decisions would be carried out via telegram. At this point RKO, in a perilous financial situation and fearing another commercial failure, wrested control of the film from Welles' Mercury Productions staff, cut over fifty minutes of footage, and added a reshot, upbeat ending: the cut footage, including Welles's original ending to the film, has been lost, apparently permanently. This event marked the beginning of a recurring pattern in Welles' Hollywood career of damaging executive interference. Ironically, Welles' South American documentary, entitled It's All True, never saw completion in Welles' lifetime. The surviving footage was released in 1993. 1993.]] In 1946, International Pictures released The Stranger, starring Edward G. Robinson and Loretta Young as well as Welles himself. Sam Spiegel produced the film, which gave Welles an opportunity to salvage—briefly—his reputation in Hollywood. A noir-ish suspense film about the hunt for a Nazi war criminal, The Stranger was Welles' only commercial success as a director. Welles supposedly made the film to prove that he could make a conventional picture within time and budget constraints. He followed The Stranger with another noir drama for Columbia Pictures, The Lady from Shanghai. Welles played the protagonist, while his second wife, Rita Hayworth, played one of the villains. Hayworth said of Orson Welles, "...a most brilliant auteur and lover. I just wish he hadn't become so fat. It affected his performance in movies and the bedroom." Like The Magnificent Ambersons, The Lady from Shanghai suffered heavy editing by its studio, with approximately an hour removed from Welles' final cut. The excised portions are believed to be lost permanently. Welles' notes for the film suggest that these portions would have aided audiences' comprehension of the story. Despite the editing, the theatrical cut still contains many examples of Welles' Expressionist film-making. Once released, the film was savaged by critics for its convoluted plot, and audiences disliked Hayworth as a villain. Welles' marriage to Hayworth—already troubled during filming—ended shortly after the production wrapped. Welles changed studios once again, moving to Republic Pictures, a studio with a reputation for making B movies. The move marked a return to Shakespeare for Welles—he chose to direct and star in an idiosyncratic production of Macbeth. Working with a very limited budget, Welles fashioned a Macbeth that emphasized the darkness of the play's themes and characters. Unfortunately for Welles, the finished film once again proved unpalatable to the movie-going public.
Welles after Hollywood
Macbeth Frustrated by his experience with the studio system, Welles left Hollywood in 1948. The following year, he made a notable appearance in front of the camera. In Graham Greene's The Third Man, Welles (as Harry Lime) gave the infamous "Cuckoo Clock" speech. 'In Italy for 30 years under the Borgias they had warfare, terror, murder, and bloodshed, but they produced Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and the Renaissance. In Switzerland they had brotherly love—they had 500 years of democracy and peace, and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.' This is the only piece of dialogue in the film which Greene himself did not write: Welles penned it himself and insisted that it be put in. Greene is reputed to have hated it (possibly because the cuckoo clock was not, in fact, a Swiss invention). From 1949 to 1952, Welles worked on Othello, filming the entire work on location in Europe and Morocco. Despite winning the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the film was never given a general release in the United States and played only in New York and Los Angeles. In 1992, this film was restored from a nitrate negative that had been feared lost and went on a successful theatrical run in America. The entire score was rerecorded, and the result is a powerful rendition that belies the usual view that Welles had lost his touch. The cinemetography is remarkable, and the entire effect gripping. Cannes Film Festival.]] In 1958, he made his final return to Hollywood when Charlton Heston convinced the studio to give Welles a shot at writing and directing the adaptation of Whit Masterson's pulp novel in Touch of Evil. Despite being filled with revolutionary lighting and camera techniques, as well as what is obviously a precursor to Hitchcock's Psycho, the film was once again wrestled from Welles' hands and severely cut down and reshot - Welles protested, even going so far as to write a 58-page memo, but his efforts were in vain. The film was left to rot as the B-picture behind Harry Keller's The Female Animal, but was widely praised across Europe, awarded the top-prize at the Brussels World's Fairthe by judges (and then-critics) Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut, who both cited it as being highly influential on their debut's The 400 Blows (1959) and Breathless (1960). (In 1998, editor Walter Murch, working from the original memo and a workprint version, restored the film to Welles' original vision.) Casting off Hollywood over numerous bad experiences, Welles' spent the rest of his directorial career in Europe, his films self-financed from acting fees or, later, funded by sympathetic producers. On almost all of these projects he retained final cut, but the independence thus gained also resulted in drastically reduced budgets and technical facilities - The Trial came about when he was offered a list of public-domain novels to adapt, Chimes at Midnight was filmed on-and-off for years and F for Fake was pieced together from a previous 50-minute documentary. Despite such setbacks, some of Welles' best work was produced during this period from 1948 until his death in 1985.
Television
A lesser known, but still important, aspect of Welles' career was his work in television. The Orson Welles Sketchbook (1955) was created for the BBC and featured Welles telling stories and drawing pictures to illustrate them. The director also created Around the World with Orson Welles (1955) for the BBC. In this series he gleefully experimented with a film-essay format, foreshadowing the later F for Fake (1974). The Fountain of Youth (1958) was made for American TV and in it Welles offers some possibilities for expanding the medium's vocabulary. The Immortal Story (1968) was filmed for French television and stars not only Welles himself, but also Jeanne Moreau, one of the most loved actresses of the French New Wave cinema; based on a short story by Isak Dinesen, it is a spare and somber meditation on old age, isolation, and the inability to create. One of his most playful efforts was Portrait of Gina (1958), in which the director/narrator wanders through Italy, finally arriving at Gina Lollobrigida's home at the end of the film. Welles continued to work in TV through the 60s, 70s and 80s, but little of the work he directed from this period was ever broadcast. A version of The Merchant of Venice (1969) was not completed because a reel was stolen and never recovered. Clips from unfinished TV projects appear in the documentary Orson Welles: The One-Man Band (1995), a fascinating but bittersweet look at many of the director's varied efforts,
Unfinished projects
Welles' exile from Hollywood and reliance on independent finance meant that many of his later cinema projects were filmed in a piecemeal fashion and some were not completed at all. In the mid 1950s Welles worked on a film adaptation of Cervantes' Don Quixote, initially on a commission from CBS television. CBS was unhappy with the original half hour television play and rejected the footage. Welles gleefully took this as an opportunity to expand the film to feature length, developing the screenplay to take Quixote and Sancho Panza into the modern age (an idea that later formed the basis of Jean-Marie Poiré's Les Visiteurs). Filming continued in a fragmentary fashion for a number of years whenever cast and crew could be assembled in one place. The project was finally abandoned with the death of Francisco Reiguera, the actor playing Quixote, in 1969. An incomplete version of the film was released in 1992. 1992 on the set of The Other Side of the Wind.]] In 1970 Welles began shooting The Other Side of the Wind. Finance was from a number of sources, the largest of which being an Iranian company based in Paris and run by the brother-in-law of the Shah of Iran. The film is apparently the story of the efforts of a film director (played by John Huston) to complete his last Hollywood movie and is largely set at a lavish party. Although in 1972 the film was reported by Welles as being "96% complete" its legal ownership became a matter of dispute. Argument continued for a number of years until the 1979 Iranian Revolution effectively consigned it to a legal limbo. The negative remained in a Paris vault until in 2004 Welles's friend Peter Bogdanovich (who also acted in the film) announced his intention to resolve the legal difficulties and complete the production. Footage from the film is included in the documentary Working with Orson Welles (1993) Other unfinished projects include an adaptation of Charles William's The Deep, abandoned due to the death of Laurence Harvey despite being one scene away from completion and The Big Brass Ring, the script of which was adapted and filmed by US-director George Hickenlooper in 1999. Mark Millar wrote an article about a failed Orson Welles Batman project. This generated a considerable amount of buzz, especially on Ain't It Cool News, but the rumor has since been proven false. Welles did, at one point prior to Kane, consider reprising his role as Lamont Cranston for a Shadow film project. But, as with the mooted film adaptation of War of the Worlds, he opted to forego these commercial projects in favor of more personal works.
Final years
Ain't It Cool News A man known for his large appetites, Welles became extremely overweight in his later years. He capitalized on his image in various advertising campaigns for certain brands of wines, hot dogs, and correspondence courses. A bootleg of the recording session for one of his later commercials still circulates on the Internet and elsewhere, often known simply as Frozen Peas. In the recording, Welles can be heard brazenly chastising the commercial's producers for its poor script and their "impossible, meaningless" directions, before walking out on the session, telling them that "no money is worth this." Another bootlegged recording features a clearly inebriated Welles struggling, and failing, to get through his lines in a commercial for a California champagne. During his career he won one Oscar and was nominated for a further four. One of his most notable film appearances was as Cardinal Wolsey in A Man for All Seasons (1966). In 1971 the Academy gave him an Honorary award "For superlative artistry and versatility in the creation of motion pictures". Welles died of a heart attack in Hollywood, California at age 70 on October 10, 1985 (the same day as Yul Brynner). The final role Welles performed was that of the planet-eater Unicron in the animated Transformers: The Movie, recording his lines mere weeks before his passing. However, it was not his last appearance on the screen, as the previously-filmed 1987 independent movie Someone To Love, was released two years following his death. His last TV appearance was in the introduction of the episode "The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice" of the series Moonlighting. Welles also recorded a narration for the 1987 re-release of The Alan Parsons Project's Tales of Mystery and Imagination shortly before his death.
Welles' ashes were placed at the estate of a friend in Ronda, Spain, at his request. Some reports mention that some of his ashes may have been scattered in the town's famous Plaza de Toros, the oldest bullfighting ring in Spain that is still used. Prominent critic Geoff Andrew has said, 'He remains that rarity – a genius of the cinema.'
Trivia

- While many consider his greatest work to be Citizen Kane, Welles personally saw The Trial and Chimes at Midnight as his most rewarding achievements, and considered The Stranger to be the least of his films.
- Orson Welles' distinctive voice was used in Warner Brothers animated cartoon "Pinky and The Brain", with Maurice LaMarche providing the voice of The Brain with a dead-on impersonation of Welles. This impersonation was also used in the film 'Ed Wood' with Vincent D'Onofrio as Welles with LaMarche's voice dubbed over. voice
- The novel Mr. Arkadin, supposedely written by Orson Welles, is in fact ghost-written by a French author - Welles has stated that he had no idea about its existence until he saw it in a bookstore.
- Initially, George Lucas wanted to use Orson Welles' voice for Darth Vader in Star Wars, as he had always intended to replace the voice of British bodybuilder David Prowse, who was the character's physical form and performed the dialogue during the shooting. However, Lucas wanted a darker, more sinister voice, and later took into consideration the fact that Welles' mysterious baritone was too familiar, and instead chose a relatively unknown veteran character actor and classically-trained thespian named James Earl Jones. However, Welles did perform the narration for the film's first trailer, released in late 1976.
- Orson Welles was Francis Ford Coppola's first choice to play Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now (1979)), ironically based on the novel Heart of Darkness which Welles was planning to adapt before he wrote Citizen Kane.
- His obesity and early death were attributed to his regular diet: two steaks and a pint of scotch. During his early years, especially while filming Citizen Kane, Welles' entire dinner menu also included a full pineapple, triple pistacio ice cream, and a full bottle of scotch.
- He also narrated pieces for the Odinist heavy metal band Manowar, on their Battle Hymns (1982) and Fighting The World (1987) albums, the latter released two years after Welles' death.
- His character of The Shadow was parodied in the popular comic series, The Spirit.
- He was born on the same day that Babe Ruth hit his very first home run.
Selected filmography
Directed by Welles
- Citizen Kane (1941) - won Oscar for Best Writing, Original Screenplay; nominated for Best Actor, Best Picture and Best Director.
- The Magnificent Ambersons (1942) - nominated for Oscar for Best Picture; shortened and recut against Welles's wishes, footage forever lost
- The Stranger (1946)
- The Lady from Shanghai (1947) - shortened and recut against Welles's wishes, footage forever lost
- Macbeth (1948) - shortened and recut against Welles's wishes, recently restored to original vision
- Othello (1952) - winner of the Palme d'Or, 1952 Cannes Film Festival
- Mr. Arkadin (aka Confidential Report) (1955) - shortened and recut against Welles's wishes, restoration to original vision in progress
- Touch of Evil (1958) - winner of the top-prize at the Brussells World's Fair; shortened and recut against Welles' wishes, recently restored to original vision
- The Trial (1962)
- Chimes at Midnight (1965)
- The Immortal Story (1968)
- F for Fake (aka Vérités et mensonges) (1974) Other notable films
- Hearts of Age (1934) - Welles' first foray into film, a silent, one-reel piece he made at age 18
- Too Much Johnson (1938)
- Swiss Family Robinson (1940) - narration
- It's All True (1942)
- Journey Into Fear (1943) - actor, co-director with Norman Foster
- Jane Eyre (1944 movie) (1944) - actor (Rochester)
- Duel in the Sun (1946) - narration
- Monsieur Verdoux (1947) - story idea
- The Third Man (1949) actor, dialogue
- Moby Dick (1956) - actor
- Compulsion (1959) - actor
- A Man for All Seasons (1966) - actor
- Casino Royale (1967) - actor
- Don Quixote (1969, released 1992) - writer, director, actor
- The Deep (1970, unfinished) - actor, writer, director
- The Other Side of the Wind (1970-76, unreleased) - writer, director
- The Muppet Movie (1979) - actor
- History of the World, Part One (1981) - narration
- Transformers: The Movie (1986) - voice actor
Further reading
Transformers: The Movie
- Cowie, Peter. The Cinema of Orson Welles, Da Capo Press, 1973.
- Mac Liammóir, Micháel. Put Money in Thy Purse: The Filming of Orson Welles' Othello, Methuen, 1976.
- McBride, Joseph. Orson Welles, Da Capo Press, 1996.
- Naremore, James. The Magic World of Orson Welles, Southern Methodist University Press, 1989.
- Naremore, James. Citizen Kane: A Casebook, Oxford University Press, 2004.
- Welles, Orson et al. This is Orson Welles, Da Capo Press, 1998.
External links

-
- [http://www.thegoldenyears.org/welles.html Classic Movies (1939 - 1969): Orson Welles]
- [http://www.war-ofthe-worlds.co.uk/ War Of The Worlds] website provides history of the broadcast and additional historical material on War Of The Worlds
- [http://www.mercurytheatre.info/ Mercury Theatre on the Air] website provides MP3 and Real Audio files of Welles' radio dramas
- [http://wellesnet.com/ Wellesnet] The Orson Welles Web Resource
- [http://ambersons.com/ The Magnificent Ambersons] a site that details the strange saga of Welles' second film
- [http://www.geocities.com/orsonwelleslives/ The Unseen Welles] a guide to Welles' unfinished and unreleased projects
- [http://www.indiana.edu/~liblilly/guides/welles/orsonwelles.html The Orson Welles collection] at the Lilly Library
- [http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/directors/03/welles.html Senses of Cinema: Great Directors Critical Database]
- [http://www.ubu.com/outsiders/365/03-1.html UBU Web's 365 Days Project] Outtake from Welles's Frozen Peas commercial. Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson Welles, Orson ja:オーソン・ウェルズ

The War of the Worlds (novel)
: ] The War of the Worlds (1898) by H. G. Wells, is an early science fiction invasion novel (or novella) which describes the fictional turn of the nineteenth century invasion of Earth by aliens from Mars, who use laser-like Heat-Rays, chemical weapons (the Black smoke), mechanical three-legged "fighting machines" (precursors to the tank), and crab-like handling-machines. After defeating the resistance, the Martians devastate much of southeastern England before being unexpectedly killed by terrestrial diseases, to which they have no immunity.
Setting
The majority of the action takes place in the countryside of early 20th century southeast England. The first Martian landing is on Horsell common, on the outskirts of the narrator's home town, Woking. Other major action occurs near Southend, where the narrator's brother and his companions gain passage on a steamboat while fleeing to mainland Europe.
Sequence of events
There were ten mentioned Martian landings commencing just after midnight in June during "the first years of the Twentieth Century":
- First Martian Landing (Day 1): Horsell Common.
- Second Martian Landing (Day 2): Addlestone Golf Links.
- Third Martian Landing (Day 3): Pyrford.
- Fourth Martian Landing (Day 4): Bushey Heath.
- Fifth Martian Landing (Day 5): Sheen.
- Sixth Martian Landing (Day 6): Wimbledon.
- Seventh Martian Landing (Day 7): Primrose Hill, London.
- 8th, 9th, 10th Landings (Days 8, 9, 10): not mentioned in the book - presumably within London. The duration of the war was three weeks:
- Days One and Two were the Martians securing their initial bridgehead around Woking.
- Day Three was the first major offensives of the invasion (Battle of Weybridge/Shepperton and the opening of the attack on London).
- Day Four was the day of the great panic and escape from London.
- Day Five was when the narrator was imprisoned by the fifth Martian landing.
- Day Six was when the city of London was totally occupied by the Martians.
- Day Seven was the Battle of Southend.
- Days Eight through twenty-one were when the narrator was watching the Martians while still trapped.
- Days 19 and 20 were when the narrator made his way to London.
- Day 21 (early morning) was when the Martians were found dead.
Analysis
Wells was a strong supporter of the theory of evolution, and saw every species as being engaged in a constant, and often brutal struggle for survival. In the book, the Martian/mankind conflict was portrayed as a similar struggle, but on a larger scale. At the time, some astronomers had observed what they thought were canals on Mars, and the belief in intelligent extraterrestrial life was quite popular. The book has been viewed as an indictment of European colonial actions in Africa, Asia, Australasia, and the Americas. In the mindset of the time, European technological superiority was seen as evidence of all-round superiority, and thus Europeans were more qualified to administer colonized regions than their native inhabitants. The novel challenges this perspective by depicting the injustice of the Martian invasion, the comparative Martian technological superiority notwithstanding. :"And before we judge them [the aliens] too harshly, we must remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its own inferior races. The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?"—Chapter I, "The Eve of the War." Wells seems to have taken great pleasure in the fictional devastation of locations where he had spent an unhappy childhood. The story has been repeatedly adapted, most famously as Orson Welles's 1938 radio drama, as several movies, and as a bestselling concept album, all of which have played some part in maintaining the public's interest in the original novel.
Unanswered questions from the book

- The narrator commented that on the fourth or fifth night of his imprisonment in the rubble of the fifth Martian landing, he heard two sets of six distinct reports - sounding like heavy guns firing. The epilogue did not give any explanation for this event.
- No after-battle report from the Southend engagement (Martians vs HMS Thunder Child) was given out, so it was not explained if the three supporting ironclads did any damage to the third Martian fighting machine, or any further information on the flying-machine sighting.
- No information on the landing areas for the eighth, ninth, and tenth Martian invasion ships were given. The only information from the book was that the site of the seventh landing was "the final and largest" base.
- The narrator's name was never revealed. Some altered versions say he was H.G. Wells himself.
Influence
This theme of an alien invasion has remained popular ever since, some recent examples being Footfall by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, the "Worldwar" series by Harry Turtledove, and the film Independence Day. Tim Burton's farcical Mars Attacks! shares many themes with The War of the Worlds, particularly the unexpected and inglorious demise of the Martian invaders. A number of people have written stories that pay homage to The War of the Worlds, often telling how the invasion went in places other than Britain. Two notable stories of this type are "Night of the Cooters" by Howard Waldrop, in which a Martian war machine lands in Texas, and "Foreign Devils" by Walter Jon Williams, set in China. War of the Worlds: Global Dispatches, edited by Kevin J. Anderson, is an anthology of such stories (ISBN 0553103539). The idea of powered armor and huge, walking, piloted war machines also originated in The War of the Worlds. The AT-AT walkers in The Empire Strikes Back were roughly based on the idea of walking war machines. H.G. Wells' Martians may have also influenced the BattleTech and MechWarrior game series. Eric Brown wrote a short story, Ulla, Ulla, (2002) about an expedition to Mars, finding the truth behind H.G. Wells' novel. The Tripods is a sci-fi trilogy for young adults written between 1967 and 1968 by John Christopher. It depicts the Earth after it has been overcome by aliens in three-legged machines. Humanity has been enslaved, and the books focus on the struggle by some teenagers to free the world of alien domination. Within six weeks of the novel's original 1897 magazine serialization, the New York Journal American began running a sequel, Edison's Conquest of Mars by Garrett P. Serviss, about an American counterattack against the Martians, spearheaded by Thomas Edison. The sequel debuted in the January 12 issue of the Journal American and ran until the February 10 issue. The sequel was published in book form in 1947, and an abridged version appeared in 1954 in The Treasury of Science Fiction Classics. In 1969, Forrest J. Ackerman published an edited version, called Invasion of Mars. In 2005, Apogee Books published an unedited, unabridged version with the original magazine illustrations (ISBN 0-9738203-0-6). A French-Canadian author, Jean-Pierre Guillet, wrote a sequel to the book called "La Cage de Londres," which when translated means "The Cage of London." After the aliens were defeated, they plotted revenge, and came back prepared to finally enslave humanity, and breed it for their bloody needs. The Cage of London is one of those breeding sites. In the comic version of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the invasion by the Martians is told from the perspective of The League, who are instructed to contact Doctor Moreau so that they can unleash H-142, a biological weapon that is a hybrid of anthrax and streptococcus upon the Martians. In the novel W. G. Grace's Last Case by Willie Rushton, W. G. Grace and Dr. Watson avert a second Martian invasion by attacking the Martian fleet on the far side of the moon with "bombs" containing influenza germs. In the 1970's, Marvel Comics had a character named Killraven Warrior of the Worlds who (in an alternate timeline) fought H. G. Wells' Martians after their second invasion of Earth. He first appeared in Amazing Adventures volume 2 #18. In 1975, Manly Wade Wellman and his son Wade Wellman published Sherlock Holmes' War of the Worlds in which Holmes, Dr. Watson, and Professor Challenger experience the events described in the original H.G. Wells novel. In 1978, Toshihiro Nishikado working at Taito designed the aliens for the popular arcade video game Space Invaders based on the description of the octopus-like Martians from the original Wells novel, according to an October 2005 interview with the British gaming magazine The Edge.
See also

- The War of the Worlds (radio)
- Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds
- The War of the Worlds (1953 film)
- The War of the Worlds (arcade game)
- The War of the Worlds (computer game)
- War of the Worlds (1988 TV series)
- The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (volume II adapts the book to comics with liberties)
- War of the Worlds (2005 film)
- H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds (2005 film)
- H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds (2005 film)
External links

-
- [http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians/science_fiction/warofworlds.html Study Guide for The War of the Worlds]
- [http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Galaxy/3773/waroftheworlds/part1/timeline.html Timeline of the Invasion]
- [http://www.learnoutloud.com/waroftheworlds War of the Worlds Audio & Video Resources]
- [http://www.freeclassicaudiobooks.com/audiobooks/War_of_the_Worlds/War.htm Free audiobook download of War of the Worlds]
- [http://www.war-ofthe-worlds.co.uk/ Historical perspective on The War Of The Worlds]
- [http://www.english-literature-online.com/h-g-wells/war-of-the-worlds/ Read The War of the Worlds Online] in an easy to read HTML format
- [http://drzeus.best.vwh.net/wotw/wotw.html The War of the Worlds - Book Cover Collection] War of the Worlds (novel), The War of the Worlds (novel), The Category:Dieselpunk War of the Worlds (novel), The War of the Worlds (novel), The

Mercury Theatre
The Mercury Theatre was a theatre company founded in New York City by Orson Welles and John Houseman. They had initial success in the theatre, then went to radio, and one of the most notable radio broadcasts of all time, The War of the Worlds. In addition to Welles and Houseman, The Mercury Theatre troupe included Joseph Cotten, Martin Gabel, Alice Frost, Ray Collins, Paul Stewart, Virginia Welles, Agnes Moorehead, and Everett Sloane. Much of the troupe would later appear in Welles' films at RKO, particularly Citizen Kane and The Magnificent Ambersons.
Theatre
Their first production was the June 1937 staging of Marc Blitzstein's controversial labor union opera, The Cradle Will Rock." [http://www.mercury-theatre.com/bio.html] Later that same year, beginning with assets of only $100, Welles and the Mercury company earned a reputation for their inventive adaptations of William Shakespeare's works: Julius Caesar set in contemporary Fascist Italy, and a voodoo-themed Macbeth with an exclusively African American cast. The last five minutes of a Macbeth performance survives on film; it can be downloaded from The Mercury Theatre on the Air website. (see below)
Radio
Welles had already worked extensively in radio drama, playing The Shadow for a year, and directing a seven-part adaptation of Victor Hugo's Les Misérables. In 1938, he was offered a chance to direct his own weekly, hour-long radio series, initially called First Person Singular, then The Mercury Theatre on the Air. Welles insisted his Mercury company--actors and crew--be involved in the radio series. This was an unprecedented and expensive request, especially for one so young as Welles. He won out, however, and went on to produce some of the finest radio drama of any era. The Mercury Theatre on the Air was an hour-long dramatic radio program which began in the summer of 1938 on the CBS radio network. Most episodes dramatized many works of classic and contemporary literature. Houseman wrote the early scripts for the series himself, turning the job over to Howard Koch at the beginning of October. Music for the program was conducted by Bernard Herrmann. Their first radio production was of Bram Stoker's Dracula, with Welles playing both Count Dracula and Doctor Seward; other adaptations included Treasure Island, A Tale of Two Cities, The 39 Steps, The Man Who Was Thursday and The Count of Monte Cristo. Originally scheduled for nine weeks, the network extended the run into the autumn, moving the show from its Monday night slot, where it was the summer substitute for the Lux Radio Theater, to a Sunday night slot opposite Edgar Bergen's popular variety show. The early programs were praised by critics, but ratings were low. One broadcast changed the ratings: The October 30, 1938 adaptation of H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds. Possibly thousands of listeners thought Martians were in fact invading the earth, due to the faux-news quality of most of the broadcast. Significant publicity was generated, and The Mercury Theatre on the Air quickly became one of radio's top-rated shows. The War of the Worlds notoriety had a welcome side effect of netting the show the sponsorship of Campbell's Soup, guaranteeing its survival for a period, and beginning on December 9, 1938, the show was known as The Campbell Playhouse. Welles revived the Mercury Theatre title for a short series in the summer of 1946. The company moved to Hollywood for their second season, and continued briefly after Welles' final perfomance in March of 1940. Many of the Mercury Theatre productions can be downloaded from The Mercury Theatre on the Air website. (see below)
External links

- [http://www.otrdigest.com/ The Internet OTR Digest (Email Old-Time Radio Discussion list)]
- [http://www.mercurytheatre.info/ The Mercury Theatre on the Air] (includes MP3s of all surviving broadcasts)
- [http://www.war-ofthe-worlds.co.uk/ War of the Worlds] website provides history of the War of the Worlds broadcast
- [http://www.lofcom.com/nostalgia/phorums/list.php?f=27 The Orson Welles Discussion Phorum] Category:Radio drama Category:Theatre companies

Halloween

] Halloween is an observance celebrated on the night of October 31, most notably by children dressing in costumes and going door-to-door collecting candy. It is celebrated in much of the Western world, though most common in the United States, Puerto Rico, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Canada and sometimes in Australia and New Zealand. Irish, Scots and other immigrants brought older versions of the tradition to North America in the 19th century. Most other Western countries have embraced Halloween as a part of American pop culture in the late 20th century. The term "Halloween" (or eve) before the feast of All Saints (an important day in the Christian calendar), which used to be called "All Hallows" derived from All Hallowed Souls. In Ireland, the name was Hallow Eve and this name is still used by some older people. Halloween was also sometimes called All Saints' Eve. The holiday was a day of religious festivities in various northern European pagan traditions, until it was appropriated by Christian missionaries and given a Christian reinterpretation. In Mexico and Belgium November 2nd, after All Saint's Day, following Halloween, is the Day of the Dead. Halloween is also called Pooky Night in some parts of Ireland, presumably named after the púca, a mischievous spirit. In Great Britain and Ireland in particular, the pagan Celts celebrated the Day of the Dead on All Hallows Day (1st November). The spirits supposedly rose from the dead and, in order to attract them, food was left on the doors. To scare off the evil spirits, the Celts wore masks. When the Romans invaded Britain, they embellished the tradition with their own, which is both a celebration of the harvest and of honoring the dead. Very much later, these traditions were transported to the United States and Canada and other places in the New World. Halloween is sometimes associated with the occult. Many European cultural traditions hold that Halloween is one of the "liminal" times of the year when the spirit world can make contact with the natural world and when magic is most potent (see, for example, Catalan mythology about witches). Anoka, Minnesota, USA, the self-proclaimed "Halloween Capital of the World," celebrates with a large civic parade. Salem, Massachusetts, USA, also has laid claim to the title "Halloween Capital of the World," though Salem has tried to separate itself from its history in the subject of witchcraft. Despite that, the city does see a great deal of tourism surrounding the Salem witch trials, especially around Halloween.

Symbols

Salem witch trials Salem witch trials Halloween's theme is spooky or scary things particularly involving death, magic, or mythical monsters. Commonly-associated Halloween characters include ghosts, ghouls, witches, bats, black cats, owls, spiders, goblins, zombies, skeletons and demons, as well as certain fictional figures like Dracula and Frankenstein's monster. Homes are often decorated with these symbols around Halloween. Black and orange are the traditional colors of Halloween. In modern Halloween images and products, purple, green, and red are also prominent. Elements of the autumn season, such as pumpkins and scarecrows, are also reflected in symbols of Halloween. The jack-o'-lantern, a carved vegetable lit by a candle inside, is one of Halloween's most prominent symbols. In Britain and Ireland, a turnip was and sometimes still is used, but immigrants to America quickly adopted the pumpkin because it was more readily available; additionally, it is much larger and easier to carve. Many families that celebrate Halloween carve a pumpkin into a frightening or comical face and place it on their home's doorstep after dark. The practice was originally intended to frighten away evil spirits or monsters.

Trick-or-treating and guising

The main event of modern US-style Halloween is trick-or-treating, in which children dress up in costume disguises and go door-to-door in their neighborhood, ringing each doorbell and yelling "trick or treat!" . This is a watered-down version of the older tradition of guising in Ireland and Scotland . The occupants of the house (who might themselves dress in a scary costume) will then hand out small candies, miniature chocolate bars or other treats. Some American homes will use sound effects and fog machines to help set a spooky mood. Other house decoration themes (that are less scary) are used to entertain younger visitors. Children can often accumulate many treats on Halloween night, filling up entire pillow cases or shopping bags. In Ireland, great bonfires were lit throughout the breadth of the land. Young children in their guises were gladly received by the neighbors with some 'fruit, apples and nuts' for the 'Halloween Party', whilst older male siblings played innocent pranks on bewildered victims. In Scotland, children or guisers are more likely to recite "The sky is blue, the grass is green, may we have our Hallowe'en" instead of "trick or treat!". They visit neighbours in groups and must impress the members of the houses they visit with a song, poem, trick, joke or dance in order to earn their treats. Traditionally, nuts, oranges, apples and dried fruit were offered, though sometimes children would also earn a small amount of cash, usually a sixpence. Very small children often take part, for whom the experience of performing can be more terrifying than the ghosties outside. Tricks play less of a role in modern Halloween, though Halloween night is often marked by vandalism such as soaping windows, egging houses or stringing toilet paper through trees. Before indoor plumbing was so widespread, tipping over or displacing outhouses was a popular form of intimidation. Typical Halloween costumes have traditionally been monsters such as vampires, ghosts, witches, and devils. In 19th-century Scotland and Ireland the reason for wearing such fearsome (and non-fearsome) costumes was the belief that since the spirits that were abroad that night were essentially intent on doing harm, the best way to avoid this was to fool the spirits into believing that you were one of them. In recent years, it has become common for costumes to be based on themes other than traditional horror, such as dressing up as a character from a TV show or movie, or choosing a recognizable face from the public sphere, such as a politician (in 2004, for example, George W. Bush and John F. Kerry were both popular costumes in America). In 2001, after the September 11 attacks, for example, costumes of firefighters, police officers, and United States military personnel became popular among children. In 2004, an estimated 2.15 million children in the United States were expected to dress up as Spider Man, the year's most popular costume. [http://www.nrf.com/content/default.asp?folder=press/release2004&file=costumes1004.htm&bhcp=1] "'Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF" has become a common sight during Halloween in North America. Started by UNICEF in 1950, the program involves the distribution of small boxes by schools to trick-or-treaters, in which they can solicit small change donations from the houses they visit. It is estimated that children have collected more than $119 million for UNICEF since its inception. BIGresearch conducted a survey for the National Retail Federation in the US and found that 53.3% of consumers planned to buy a costume for Halloween 2005, spending $38.11 on average (up 10 dollars from last year). An estimate of $3.3 billion was made for the holiday spending. A child usually "grows out of" trick-or-treating by his or her teenage years. Trick-or-treating by teenagers is accepted, but generally ridiculed with genial ribbing by those handing out candy. Teenagers and adults instead often celebrate Halloween with costume parties, staying home to give out candy, listening to halloween music, scaring people, or attending social get-togethers.

Games and other activities

There are several games traditionally associated with Halloween parties. The most common is dooking or bobbing for apples, in which apples float in a tub or a large basin of water; the participants must use their teeth to remove an apple from the basin. Another variant involves kneeling on a chair, holding a fork between the teeth and trying to drop the fork into them. Another common game involves hanging up treacle or syrup-coated scones by strings; these must be eaten without using hands while they remain attached to the string, an activity which inevitably leads to a very sticky face. Some games traditionally played at Halloween are forms of divination. In Puicíní (pronounced "pooch-eeny"), a game played in Ireland, a blindfolded person is seated in front of a table on which several saucers are placed. The saucers are shuffled and the seated person then chooses one by touch. The contents of the saucer determine the person's life for the following year. A saucer containing earth means someone known to the player will die during the next year, a saucer containing water foretells travel, a coin means new wealth, a bean means poverty, etc. In 19th-century Ireland, young women placed slugs in saucers sprinkled with flour. The wriggling of the slugs and the patterns subsequently left behind on the saucers were believed to portray the faces of the women's future spouses. In North America, unmarried women were frequently told that if they sat in a darkened room and gazed into a mirror on Halloween night, the face of their future husband would appear in the mirror. However, if they were destined to die before they married, a skull would appear. The custom was widespread enough to be commemorated on greeting cards from the late nineteenth century. The telling of ghost stories and viewing of horror films are common fixtures of Halloween parties. Television specials with a Halloween theme, usually aimed at children, are commonly aired on or before the holiday while new horror films are often released theatrically before the holiday to take advantage of the atmosphere.

Foods

Television specials Because the holiday comes in the wake of the annual apple harvest, Candy Apples (also known as toffee, taffy or caramel apples) are a common treat at Halloween. They are made by rolling whole apples in a sticky sugar syrup, and sometimes then rolling them in nuts. At one time candy apples were a common treat given to children, but this practice rapidly waned after widespread rumors that some individuals were embedding items like pins and razor blades in the apples that they would pass out to children. While there is evidence of such incidents occurring they are very rare and have never resulted in any serious injuries (see [http://snopes.com/horrors/mayhem/needles.asp?print=y Snopes ] article on the subject). Nonetheless, many parents were under the assumption that the practice was common. At the peak of this hysteria, some hospitals were offering to x-ray children's Halloween haul at no cost in order to look for such items. Almost all of the very few Halloween candy poisoning (as opposed to tainting) incidents on record involved parents who poisoned their own children's candy, while there are occasional reports of kids sticking needles in their own candy (and that of other children) more in an effort to get attention than cause any harm (again, see [http://snopes.com/horrors/poison/halloween.asp?print=y Snopes ] for details of individual incidents). Yet the paranoia has continued unabated mostly because of the news media's misinformation and tendency to exaggerate threats - especially when children are involved. A Halloween custom which has survived unchanged to this day in Ireland is the baking (or more often nowadays the purchase) of a barmbrack (Irish "báirín breac"). This is a light fruit cake into which a plain ring is placed before baking. It is said that whoever finds this ring will find his or her true love during the following year. Other foods associated with the holiday:
- candy corn
- bonfire toffee (in the UK)
- hot apple cider
- roasted pumpkin seeds
- "fun-sized" or individually wrapped pieces of small candy, typically in Halloween colors of orange, and brown/black.

Cultural history

Christian festival

Pope Boniface IV established an anniversary dedicated to the Virgin Mary and the martyrs when he consecrated the Pantheon on May 13, 609 (or 610). This Christian feast day was moved to November 1st from May 13th by Pope Gregory III in the eighth century in order to mark the dedication of the All Saints Chapel in Rome--establishing November 1st as All Saints Day and October 31st as All Hallows' Eve. Initially this change of date only applied to the diocese of Rome, but was extended to the rest of Christendom a century later by Pope Gregory IV in an effort to standardize liturgical worship. The feast day of All Souls Day, celebrated to commemorate those souls condemned temporarily to Purgatory, was inaugurated by St Odilo, at the time the abbott of the influential monastery at Cluny, as 2 November in 998.

Halloween's Origin: Celtic observation of Samhain

According to what can be reconstructed of the beliefs of the ancient Celts, the new year began around November 1 or on a New Moon near that date, a day referred to in modern Gaelic as Samhain ("Sow-in" or alternatively "Sa-ven", meaning: End of the summer). Just as sundown meant the start of a new day, shorter days signified the start of the new year; therefore the harvest festival began every year on the night of preceding the autumn new year date. After the adoption of the Roman calendar with its fixed months, the date began to be celebrated independently of the Moon's phases. As November 1 is the first day of the new year, the day also meant the beginning of winter, which the Celts often associated with human death. The Celts also believed that on October 31 (the night before the new year), the boundary separating the dead from the living became blurred. (There is a rich and unusual myth system at work here; the spirit world, the residence of the "Sidhe," as well as of the dead, was accessible through burial mounds. These mounds opened at two times during the year, making the beginning and end of summer highly spiritually resonant.) The Celts' survival during the cold harsh winters, depended on the prophecies of their priests or Druids. They believed that the presence of spirits would aid in the priests' abilities to make future predictions. The exact customs observed in each Celtic region differ, but they generally involved the lighting of bonfires and the reinforcement of boundaries, across which malicious spirits might cross and threaten the community. Like most observances around this season, warmth and comfort were emphasized, indulgence was not. Stores of preserved food were needed to last through the winter, not for parties.

Norse Elven Blót

In the old Norse religion an event believed to occur around the same time of the year as Halloween was the álfablót (elven blót), which involved sacrifices to the elves and the blessing of food. The elves were powers connected to the ancestors, and it can be assumed that the blót related to a cult of the ancestors. The álfablót is also celebrated in the modern revival of Norse religion, Ásatrú.

Halloween customs

Observance of Halloween faded in the South of England from the 17th century onwards, being replaced by the commemoration of the Gunpowder Plot on November 5. However it remained popular in Scotland, Ireland and the North of England. It is only in the last decade that it again became popular in the south of England, but as an entirely Americanized version. The custom survives most accurately on the Island of Ireland, where the last Monday of October is a public holiday. All schools close for the following week for mid-term, commonly called the Halloween Break. As a result Ireland and Northern Ireland are the only countries where children never have school on Halloween and are therefore free to celebrate it in the ancient and time-honored fashion. The custom of trick-or-treating is thought to have evolved from the European custom called souling, similar to the wassailing customs associated with Yule. On November 2, All Souls' Day, beggars would walk from village to village begging for "soul cakes" - square pieces of bread with currants. Christians would promise to say prayers on behalf of dead relatives helping the soul's passage to heaven. The distribution of soul cakes was encouraged by the church as a way to replace the ancient practice of leaving food and wine for roaming spirits at the Samhain. In Celtic parts of western Brittany, Samhain is still heralded by the baking of kornigou. Kornigou are cakes baked in the shape of antlers to commemorate the god of winter shedding his "cuckold" horns as he returns to his kingdom in the Otherworld.

"Punkie Night"

"Punkie Night" is observed on the last Thursday in October in the village of Hinton St. George in the county of Somerset in England. On this night, children carry lanterns made from hollowed-out mangel-wurzels (a kind of beet; in modern days, pumpkins are used) with faces carved into them. They bring these around the village, collecting money and singing the punkie song. Punkie is derived from pumpkin or punk, meaning tinder. Though the custom is only attested over the last century, and the mangel-wurzel itself was introduced into English agriculture in the late 18th century, "Punkie Night" appears to be much older even than the fable that now accounts for it. The story goes that the wives of Hinton St. George went looking for their wayward husbands at the fair held nearby at Chiselborough, the last Thursday in October, but first hollowed out mangel wurzels in order to make lanterns to light their way. The drunken husbands saw the eerie lights, thought they were "goolies" (the restless spirits of children who had died before they were baptized), and fled in terror. Children carry the punkies now. The event has spread since about 1960 to the neighboring village of Chiselborough. Sources: on-line report from the Western Gazette and a National Geographic radio segment. Chiselborough Fair is memorialized by Fair Place in the village. The National Gazetteer of Great Britain and Ireland (1868) reported that there was "a fair for horses and cattle on the last Thursday in October."

"Mischief Night"

The night before Halloween, known alternately [http://cfprod01.imt.uwm.edu/Dept/FLL/linguistics/dialect/staticmaps/q_110.html survey] as "Devil's Night", "Mischief Night", "Mizzie Night", "Gate Night", "Cabbage Night", "Mat Night", or "Goosie Night" is often associated with pranks or destructive activities performed by adolescents. Some of the acts range from minor vandalism to theft (e.g. of door mats - thus the name "Mat Night" in some areas), or even arson. Many youths involved in mischief night would be considered too old for traditional trick-or-treating. The most common wrong-doing is "T.P.ing", in which people's houses, lawns, and trees are covered in toilet paper streamer