By RAY KELLY
Torrents of terrified radio listeners fleeing their homes to escape marauding men from Mars – it’s an an unimaginable scene that fascinates William Elliot Hazelgrove, who deftly depicts it in his new book, Dead Air: The Night That Orson Welles Terrified America.
The best-selling author of Forging a President: How the Wild West Created Teddy Roosevelt and Madam President: The Secret Presidency of Edith Wilson looks at the broadcast, its effect on listeners and how it propelled Welles’ career in a book that Publisher’s Weekly has praised as “a rollicking portrait of a director on the cusp of greatness.” Rowman and Littlefield will publish Dead Air in hardcover and ebook on November 19.
The Mercury Theatre On the Air drama of October 30, 1938 was simply one of Welles’ greatest artistic achievements, says Hazelgrove, who discounts the opinion the panic was deliberately overstated by newspapers at the time. He graciously fielded questions from Wellesnet about Dead Air just in time for the 86th anniversary of the War of the Worlds broadcast.
Your previous subjects have included Teddy Roosevelt, Al Capone and the Wright Brothers. What drew you to write about Orson Welles and the War of the Worlds broadcast?
I had read several biographies on Orson Welles and was fascinated with the War of the Worlds broadcast. My fear was that there was nothing new to tell but then after some research I found the terror generated by Welles was much more than has been reported. I found out total panic enveloped the country and many aspects of that night had not made it into the history books. The newspapers tell the story and that is what I concentrated on. Local and national papers tell a very different story than the one we have been handed.
How widespread the panic across the country has been subject of considerable discussion and research. It’s fair to say that Dead Air takes the position that newspapers in 1938 didn’t deliberately overplay the impact of the CBS broadcast.
The newspapers did not overplay the broadcast. There was widespread panic. The biggest reason is CBS had 126 affiliate stations that shot the broadcast all over and the terror built like a wave. The newspapers did not conspire to hype the story to get back at radio or boost circulation. They reported the news and the news was unbelievable. People did believe Martians had invaded and they believed they were killing off the human race.
Of the various accounts of the panic you researched for Dead Air, which incidents stand out the most?
A few events stand out. One was the man who tied girls from a college to his car and drove a hundred miles to get away from the Martians. This man took the doors off his car and drove to a girls college 100 miles away to get his daughter and her friends. When he arrived all the girls were upset and wanted to leave the college. So he put as many in the car as he could and then tied girls down to the hood and across the trunk and drove 100 miles down the highway.
(Also), the man who attacked Orson after the broadcast because of his wife’s suicide due to her belief Martians were going to murder her; the wild ride on the bus in North Carolina where the driver tried to get away from the Martians; and the car accidents where people drove wildly in fear, panic, trying to get away from the terror. My book is built from newspapers… that way I found all the stories the historians have overlooked.
There has been debate as to whether Welles intentionally set out to cause a panic or if he was unaware of the audience response. His own comments in the years that followed were contradictory. Do you think Welles purposely intended to alarm listeners into believing an actual invasion was going on?
Yes, absolutely. Orson Welles did intend to deceive his audience with breaking news bulletins. He wanted to break the third wall of radio and make radio part of the broadcast by killing off his reporter and holding the silence or dead air for six seconds. He admitted it was a hoax at the end of the show and admitted it later in interviews. But more than that it was pure Orson, he was the kind of person who would thump you on the back of head and then point out the stars.
So much has been written and said about the War of the Worlds radio drama. What surprised you most about the actual broadcast?
Orson Welles was an artist. And the broadcast was the culmination of his art. Orson tore things to pieces and then stitched them back together in a very different way. This was his approach to his plays and radio work. With War of the Worlds he perfected his technique of controlled chaos. I suspected Welles deliberately wanted to scare people and make them believe Martians were invading and I found this to be true as I researched. The serendipitous nature of the broadcast was surprising with mayonnaise jars being twisted in bathroom stalls for sound effects. The fact the police wanted to stop the broadcast showed how out of control things were becoming.
It can be argued that if not for War of the Worlds, Welles might not have been courted by Hollywood and made Citizen Kane. How much of Welles’ success do you feel he owes to the War of the Worlds?
Orson owes all his success to War of the Worlds. RKO (Pictures) would never have given him a contract to make two movies if Welles had not become world famous through his broadcast. This broadcast convinced Hollywood Orson was a great artist who could pull off the greatest hoax of the century and that he could bring that talent to movies and make something great that would be amplified by Welles own fame. He was considered the boy wonder but he also was on a tear of successes in radio and in theatre. The War of the Worlds broadcast became a huge story with massive publicity.
RKO believed Orson was just getting started. I would argue Welles was at his artistic best with War of the Worlds.
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(Editor’s note: Dead Air: The Night That Orson Welles Terrified America can be pre-ordered from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Walmart and other online retailers.
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