Date:

Wednesday 5th March

Venue:

Middlesbrough Town Hall

Time:

20:00

Directed by Joanna Read

Seventy years ago, the power of radio was demonstrated in the most unexpected way. An adaptation of HG Wells' 1898 novel, The War Of The Worlds, which features a Martian invasion, had listeners fleeing from their homes in panic. The fictional news bulletins incorporated into the drama by director, co-writer and performer Orson Welles were taken for real by radio listeners who had never heard fiction presented as fact in this way. The broadcast for the CBS Mercury Theatre on the Air show became a broadcasting landmark.

Courtesy of coll. Agence Martienne
Orson Welles, Broadcasting Mercury on the Air, CBS, 1938

Acclaimed director Joanna Read, former Artistic Director and Chief Executive of Salisbury Playhouse, will direct a brand new performance of Orson Welles & Howard Koch's tour de force play. Set in the historic Middlesbrough Town Hall in front of a live audience, this production will echo the atmosphere of the original show, and will be broadcast live to air. Read's previous productions include To Kill a Mocking Bird, A Touch Of The Sun and The Wizard Of Oz, making her ideally placed to bring this iconic Orson Welles play to dramatic life in its 70th year. Likely to be one of the highlights of the festival, this is an event not to be missed.

Brand new performance of Orson Welles and Howard Koch's radio play on stage at Middlesbrough Town Hall. With Mark Benton (The Street), John Foster (BBC Tees), Michael Hodgson (55 Degrees North), Tony Boncza, Chris Garner, Phillippa Wilson and Joe Caffrey.

Star of TV's Early Doors, Clocking Off, Murphy's Law, Preston Front and more recently BBCTV's Roman Mysteries, Teesside actor Mark Benton will be appearing at Middlesbrough Town Hall on 5th March as Professor Pierson, the role originally made famous by Hollywood legend Orson Welles, in a special one-off 70th Anniversary re-enactment of Welles's highly controversial radio play War of the Worlds, as part of AV Festival 2008.

He will star alongside John Foster from BBC Tees (who plays the role of a radio reporter), stage actor Tony Boncza and an experienced cast of Geordie actors including Michael Hodgson, Chris Garner.

On Halloween seventy years ago (30th October, 1938), a radio play adaptation of H.G.Wells' novel 'War of the Worlds' - which features a Martian invasion of Earth - had American listeners fleeing their homes in panic. The fictional news bulletins incorporated into the drama by director, co-writer and performer Orson Welles' were taken as real events by radio listeners who - in the atmosphere of growing tension and anxiety in the days leading up to World War II - had never heard fiction presented as fact in this way before and mistakenly believed the events to be true!

The drama became a broadcasting landmark and arguably the most well-known radio drama in history, and now, as part of AV:08 Festival's celebration of broadcast, director Joanna Read will recreate the original radio recording and update the setting to contemporary Middlesbrough in a unique theatrical event.

Explains Joanna:

"This is the first time that this well known radio play has been performed live in the UK and we are delighted that Guisborough's very own Mark Benton has agreed to take on the challenging leading role of Professor Pierson, originally played by Orson Welles. 'His version of 'War of the Worlds' was hugely controversial when it was first performed in 1938 and we have updated the events to places and locations well known to North East audiences to give it a British twist with the first alien actually landing in Sedgfield! However I hasten to add that we are hoping to avoid widespread panic and chaos in the North East, as the original caused in New York!"

'War of the Worlds' is now viewed as the first major step in what was to become a long and illustrious, although chequered, career for Welles, which included the movies: 'A Touch of Evil', Lady From Shanghai', 'The Magnificent Ambersons', and 'Othello', as well 'Citizen Kane' - the 'greatest movie ever made' - according to the annual polls, which he wrote, directed and starred in.

Historians have calculated that although only some six million heard the CBS broadcast of 'War of the Worlds', of those that listened some 1.7 million believed it to be true, and 1.2 million were 'genuinely frightened! The uproar that followed was anything but minute: within a month there were about 12,500 newspaper articles about the broadcast or its impact.

The broadcast's fame has gone on to inspire many others including Queen's song 'Radio Gaga', which is a tribute to the medium of radio written by Roger Taylor, and which includes the lyrics: 'You gave them all those old time stars / Through wars of worlds - invaded by Mars'!

Its influence has also touched a wide variety of TV series either as direct references or in copycat story lines, ranging from: 'X-Files', 'Hey Arnold', 'The Flintstones', the cartoon series of 'Dennis the Menace', and three episodes of 'The Simpsons'. As well as a video game ('Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater'), a comic book (E C Comics' 'Weird Science'), Woody Allen's movie 'Radio Days' and book plot lines by Sidney Sheldon and Arthur C Clarke amongst others!

Produced by AV Festival 08. The War of the Worlds radio play is written by Howard Koch, adapted from the novel by HG Wells. This performance is undertaken with the permission of Anne Koch.

Tickets on sale from AV Festival Box Office & Middlesbrough Town Hall Box office.