I Love the Illusion: The Life and Career of Agnes Moorehead by Charles Tranberg
Authors: Charles Tranberg
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Pieson (Orson) of the Princeton Observatory
had observed an explosion of gas on Mars. After this “newsflash,” the music
resumed — the music (Ramon Raquello and his orchestra) keeps getting
interrupted at regular and longer intervals.
It seems that about halfway through the Bergen show his guest, the
popular operatic singer Nelson Eddy, began a song; for some that seemed
to be a good time to switch stations. For those who switched to CBS — Hooper
later concluded that 12 percent of the Bergen audience, or four million
listeners, may have switched to CBS — it was just in time to hear, according
to Frank Brady, “amidst crowd noises and police sirens, the concerned and
authentic-sounding voice of a ‘newscaster,’ direct from Wilmuth Farm in
Grover Mill, New Jersey, painting a word picture of the strange scene of the
projectile half-buried in a huge hole” with creatures emerging from the hole
and sending out rays which ignited anything in its path. Suddenly the voice
of the newscaster goes silent and the air is filled with static.
Despite an announcement about 40 minutes into the program that the
audience was listening to a dramatization, panic soon spread. According to The Encyclopedia of Orson Welles, “Priests were called to deliver last rites.
Police stations were swamped as well. A half hour into the program, panic
had seized thousands of people who were in flight, speeding along highways
to try to distance themselves from the Martian menace.” At the end of the
program, just as police were knocking on the doors to try and bring an end
to the program, Orson closed the proceedings: “This is Orson Welles, ladies
and gentlemen, out of character to assure you that ‘The War of the Worlds’
has no further significance than as the holiday offering it was intended to
be . . . the Mercury Theatre’s own radio version of dressing up in a sheet and
saying ‘Boo! . . . ’” The show, and the panic it caused, brought great
publicity, and not all of it good. The FCC banned the use of fictional news
bulletins in radio dramas, for instance.
Asked later by Peter Bogdanovich if he had expected that kind of
response from the broadcast, Welles stated, “The kind of response,
yes — that was merrily anticipated by all of us. The size of it, of course, was
flabbergasting. Six minutes after we’d gone on the air, the switchboards in
radio stations right across the country were lighting up like Christmas
trees . . . .” Welles also acknowledged that the broadcast proved beneficial
for him and the program. “Well, it put me in the movies. Was that lucky?
I don’t know. Anyway, thanks to the Martians, we got us a radio sponsor,
and suddenly we were a great big commercial program.”
Indeed they did get a sponsor, Campbell Soups. The final Mercury
program was broadcast on December 4, 1938 and on December 9, The
Campbell Playhouse, premiered. According to the authoritative Encyclopedia
of Old Time Radio, under sponsorship from Campbell soup the show
“moved up to first-class status.” It certainly did get bigger budgets which
afforded it the opportunity to utilize big name guest stars such as Margaret
Sullavan, Gertrude Lawrence, Helen Hayes, Paulette Goddard, Charles
Laughton and Lucille Ball. The “Mercury players” continued to be utilized:
Agnes, Ray Collins, George Coulouris, Paul Stewart, Everett Sloane, Joe
Cotten and so on, but they became overshadowed by the big names and
budgets. The show lost the intimate feel it had for those glorious months it
was known as The Mercury Theatre of the Air . Interestingly, once the show
became The Campbell Playhouse, Agnes began to appear more. It is worth
remembering that Agnes had appeared in only a handful of the First Person
Singular/Mercury Theatre of the Air programs — most effectively and
memorably in “Dracula.” As for the most famous broadcast, “War of the
Worlds,” she had only provided sound effects. This was nothing against
Agnes — the Mercury
had observed an explosion of gas on Mars. After this “newsflash,” the music
resumed — the music (Ramon Raquello and his orchestra) keeps getting
interrupted at regular and longer intervals.
It seems that about halfway through the Bergen show his guest, the
popular operatic singer Nelson Eddy, began a song; for some that seemed
to be a good time to switch stations. For those who switched to CBS — Hooper
later concluded that 12 percent of the Bergen audience, or four million
listeners, may have switched to CBS — it was just in time to hear, according
to Frank Brady, “amidst crowd noises and police sirens, the concerned and
authentic-sounding voice of a ‘newscaster,’ direct from Wilmuth Farm in
Grover Mill, New Jersey, painting a word picture of the strange scene of the
projectile half-buried in a huge hole” with creatures emerging from the hole
and sending out rays which ignited anything in its path. Suddenly the voice
of the newscaster goes silent and the air is filled with static.
Despite an announcement about 40 minutes into the program that the
audience was listening to a dramatization, panic soon spread. According to The Encyclopedia of Orson Welles, “Priests were called to deliver last rites.
Police stations were swamped as well. A half hour into the program, panic
had seized thousands of people who were in flight, speeding along highways
to try to distance themselves from the Martian menace.” At the end of the
program, just as police were knocking on the doors to try and bring an end
to the program, Orson closed the proceedings: “This is Orson Welles, ladies
and gentlemen, out of character to assure you that ‘The War of the Worlds’
has no further significance than as the holiday offering it was intended to
be . . . the Mercury Theatre’s own radio version of dressing up in a sheet and
saying ‘Boo! . . . ’” The show, and the panic it caused, brought great
publicity, and not all of it good. The FCC banned the use of fictional news
bulletins in radio dramas, for instance.
Asked later by Peter Bogdanovich if he had expected that kind of
response from the broadcast, Welles stated, “The kind of response,
yes — that was merrily anticipated by all of us. The size of it, of course, was
flabbergasting. Six minutes after we’d gone on the air, the switchboards in
radio stations right across the country were lighting up like Christmas
trees . . . .” Welles also acknowledged that the broadcast proved beneficial
for him and the program. “Well, it put me in the movies. Was that lucky?
I don’t know. Anyway, thanks to the Martians, we got us a radio sponsor,
and suddenly we were a great big commercial program.”
Indeed they did get a sponsor, Campbell Soups. The final Mercury
program was broadcast on December 4, 1938 and on December 9, The
Campbell Playhouse, premiered. According to the authoritative Encyclopedia
of Old Time Radio, under sponsorship from Campbell soup the show
“moved up to first-class status.” It certainly did get bigger budgets which
afforded it the opportunity to utilize big name guest stars such as Margaret
Sullavan, Gertrude Lawrence, Helen Hayes, Paulette Goddard, Charles
Laughton and Lucille Ball. The “Mercury players” continued to be utilized:
Agnes, Ray Collins, George Coulouris, Paul Stewart, Everett Sloane, Joe
Cotten and so on, but they became overshadowed by the big names and
budgets. The show lost the intimate feel it had for those glorious months it
was known as The Mercury Theatre of the Air . Interestingly, once the show
became The Campbell Playhouse, Agnes began to appear more. It is worth
remembering that Agnes had appeared in only a handful of the First Person
Singular/Mercury Theatre of the Air programs — most effectively and
memorably in “Dracula.” As for the most famous broadcast, “War of the
Worlds,” she had only provided sound effects. This was nothing against
Agnes — the Mercury
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