PBS American Experience - War of the Worlds (2013).MKV

Shortly after 8 p.m. on Halloween eve, October 30, 1938, a radio announcer broke in with a news bulletin reporting strange explosions had taken place on the planet Mars. This was followed only minutes later by a report that Martians had landed in the tiny town of Grovers Mill, New Jersey.

Most listeners understood that the program was a radio drama. But the next day's headlines reported that thousands of people - if not millions - had experienced panic, convinced that America was under a deadly Martian attack.

It turned out to be H.G. Wells' classic The War of the Worlds, performed by 23-year-old Orson Welles.

This PBS program offers a thoughtful explanation of why so many people were panicked by Welles' mischievous piece of radio theatre. A lot of it was the times. The Depression; Hitler's unsettling rise to power; the mood of the American public.