1) What is the history and narrative behind War of the Worlds?
2) When was it first broadcast and what is the popular myth regarding the reaction from the audience?
Orson Welles’ radio adaption of War of the Worlds has become notable not for the broadcast itself but for the reaction it received, and the subsequent press reporting of the audience’s reaction to the broadcast. It is often highlighted as an early example of mass hysteria caused by the media and used to support various audience theories.
2) When was it first broadcast and what is the popular myth regarding the reaction from the audience?
Broadcast live on 30th October 1938, popular myth has it that thousands of New Yorkers fled their homes in panic, and all across America people crowded the streets to witness for themselves the real space battle between earth and the Martians. The Trenton Police Department (close to the site of the fictional invasion) received over 2000 calls in less than two hours, while the New York Times switchboard received 875 calls from concerned listeners wanting to know where they would be safe. Such hysteria was caused by Welles’ clever adaption of the story, reporting on the events through faux newscasts, and presenting the narrative in a way that has been described as “too realistic and frightening.” The following morning newspapers across the country revelled in the mass hysteria it had caused.
3) How did the New York Times report the reaction the next day?
The New York Times headline read, “Radio Listeners in Panic, Taking War Drama as Fact.”
4) How did author Brad Schwartz describe the the broadcast and its reaction?
Author Brad Schwartz in his 2015 book ‘Broadcast Hysteria: Orson Welles’s War of the Worlds and the Art of Fake News’ suggests that hysteria it caused was not entirely a myth. “Instead it was something decades ahead of its time: history’s first viral-media phenomenon.” He argues that “the stories of those whom the show frightened offer a fascinating window onto how users engage with media content, spreading and reinterpreting it to suit their own world views.
5) Why did Orson Welles use hybrid genres and pastiche and what effect might it have had on the audience?
His version of War of the Worlds reworks a Victorian narrative about an alien invasion (which he considered “boring”) and turns it into an exciting radio play through his use of pastiche. By borrowing the conventions of the radio newscast, he is able to create real moments of shock and awe, which almost certainly account for the strong reaction it received. By creating a hybrid form – mixing conventional storytelling with news conventions – Welles blurred the boundaries between fact and fiction in a way that audiences had never experienced.
6) How did world events in 1938 affect the way audiences interpreted the show?
In September 1938, one month prior to the plays broadcast, Hitler signed the Munich Agreement annexing portions of Czechoslovakia and creating the ‘Sudetenland’. Europe’s failed appeasement of Germany was viewed with much concern and for many it seemed that another world war was inevitable.
7) Which company broadcast War of the Worlds in 1938?
At this time, both the radio networks, including CBS, frequently interrupted programmes to issue news bulletins with updates on the situation in Europe.
8) Why might the newspaper industry have deliberately exaggerated the response to the broadcast?
It has been suggested that the panic was trumped up by the newspapers to rubbish this new medium which it viewed as a huge threat. “Radio is new but it has adult responsibilities. It has
not mastered itself or the material it uses,” said the editorial leader in the New York Times on
November 1st 1938. Professors Jefferson Pooley and Michael J Socolow writing in Slate magazine in 2013 state: “How did the story of panicked listeners begin? Blame America’s newspapers. Radio had siphoned off advertising revenue from print during the Depression, badly damaging the newspaper industry. So, the papers seized the opportunity presented by Welles’s programme, perhaps to discredit radio as a source of news. The newspaper industry sensationalised the panic to prove to advertisers, and regulators, that radio management was irresponsible and not to be trusted.”
9) Does War of the Worlds provide evidence to support the Frankfurt School's Hypodermic Needle theory?
This states that audiences consume and respond to media texts in an unquestioning way, believing what they read, see or hear. This might be true of the audiences of the 1930s, unfamiliar with new media forms like radio, but in the modern age it carries less weight. It is questionable as to how far most of the audience were actually duped by the broadcast. As has been noted, those who ‘bought into’ the idea of an invasion, may well have been influenced by external factors such as the social and political context of the time. It was not impossible to believe that a foreign power was invading American soil in 1938.
10) How might Gerbner's cultivation theory be applied to the broadcast?
Gerbner’s Cultivation Theory might offer a more accurate explanation of the audience’s behaviour in response to the radio broadcast since it emphasises the longer-term effects that media texts have upon audiences. Based on his research into television viewing, cultivation theory states that high frequency viewers of television are more susceptible to media messages and the belief that they are real. Heavy viewers of TV are thought to be ‘cultivating’ attitudes that seem to believe that the world created by television is an accurate depiction of the real world. Applied to War of the Worlds it could be argued that an audience familiar with the frequent interruptions to radio shows over the weeks leading up to the broadcast did not question the faux invasion broadcasts during Welles’ production.
11) Applying Hall's Reception Theory, what could be the preferred and oppositional readings of the original broadcast?
Stuart Hall’s Reception Theory is useful when considering how the audience for War of the Worlds interpreted the text (as either fact or fiction). He argues that audiences might read a media text in different ways. The dominant or preferred reading by the audience is the one intended by the creator of the text. However, a person might read it in an oppositional way depending upon factors such as their age, gender or background. For example, a young male is likely to ‘read’ page three of The Sun as a bit of harmless fun (the preferred reading), whereas a female might regard it as offensive. Hall also suggests that readings of a media text might be negotiated. This is an acceptance of the preferred reading but modified in a way that reflects the audience’s own position, experiences and interests.
12) Do media products still retain the ability to fool audiences as it is suggested War of the Worlds did in 1938? Has the digital media landscape changed this?
The 1938 and 1949 radio broadcasts of War of the Worlds clearly had the power to deceive at least some of the listening audience, but could any media product create such an impact today? Are audiences too sophisticated and media-literate to be fooled by a similar stunt? In the late 1990s, and inspired by Orson Welles’ 1938 broadcast, two young filmmakers made the low budget film The Blair Witch Project. Supposedly made up ‘found footage’ shot by three student filmmakers who go missing while shooting a documentary about a local legend (the Blair Witch), the film sparked debate among audiences as to whether the footage was actually real. However, given that audiences received the text in a movie theatre (or on video and DVD) it is unlikely to have fooled the audience in quite the same way – or with the same authority – as a series of radio news bulletins.
Media Magazine article on War of the Worlds:
Read this excellent article on War of the Worlds in Media Magazine. You can find it in our Media Magazine archive - issue 69, page 10. Answer the following questions:
1) What reasons are provided for why the audience may have been scared by the broadcast in 1938?
realistic radio conventions – such as flash news bulletins, expert interviews and vox pops – and set it in contemporary New Jersey. For those who tuned in late, it seemed totally authentic
and there was a bit of a scare: the radio was a constant source of information, comfort, advice and entertainment.
2) How did newspapers present the story?
The press at the time spun the whole story very differently, something that media scholars now believe was done on purpose. The papers made a conscious decision to present it as a ‘hoax’, inferring there was something malicious about the intentions of those making and broadcasting it, and were swift to point out the sinister power of the medium of radio itself.
3) How does the article describe the rise of radio?
Since it came on the scene commercially in the 1920s, many feared radio would kill off the other main media industries at the time. The radio brought news, music and more into people’s homes in an accessible, realistic and direct way; arguably there was no need to go and buy a newspaper or record if you could just switch on your radio. Plus, listeners would get to hear the real voices of the people making the news and access information more quickly than newspapers.
4) What does the article say about regulation of radio in the 1930s?
Another industrial context was that of regulation of the radio. As a relatively new media form, there was still widespread scepticism about radio’s benefits and a lot of concern about its potential downsides. Just like the introduction of newer media today, older generations feared the corruption of the young by uncensored, unregulated radio content. Furthermore, the radio had a part to play in the rise of Adolf Hitler in Europe, and many were worried about how far radio’s influence could stretch. The government even got on board, in the shape of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which ordered an investigation into the broadcaster, CBS, which, five weeks later, ended having found no wrongdoing.
5) How does the article apply media theories to the WOTW? Give examples.
Albert Bandura in the 1960s, in which he got children to watch a video of a man beating up a Bobo Doll and they copied the violence.
George Gerbner’s ‘cultivation theory’, which says that the media can provoke certain responses from us if it repeats or cultivates a message often enough.
Stuart Hall, developed a theory of ‘reception’ that helps us understand the diverse ways audiences react. He said people make a judgement on any media text based on their experiences and understanding of the world.
6) Look at the box on page 13 of real newspaper headlines. Pick out two and write them here - you could use these in an exam answer.
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