Orson Welles' Mercury Theatre on the Air: Seventeen (Part 1 of 6)

[fromthesidelines]

Very few people bothered to hear this when it originally aired, as the #1 program at 8pm(et) Sunday nights was NBC's "CHASE & SANBORN HOUR", featuring Don Ameche as host, and Edgar Bergen & his dummy, "Charlie McCarthy". This is why it was very easy for Orson and writer Howard W. Koch to create a modern-day adaptation of "The War of the Worlds" as a series of simulated news bulletins, two weeks later. Dan Seymour is the announcer; Bernard Herrmann is the composer/conductor.