War of the Worlds
In the Rio Grande Valley
War of the Worlds Radio Adaptation
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 Thursday, Oct. 30th, marks the 65th anniversary for the great Orson Wells radio drama, the "War of the Worlds", a radio adaptation based upon the H.G. Wells classic work of literature written in the 19th century. The plot involves the agressive visitation of an invading Martian force upon the populated East Coast of the United States. So convincing was Orson Wells production performance, in spite of network messages aired repeatedly throughout the one-hour broadcast, there actually was a developing crisis on the streets of New York and New Jersey among those who listened and believed the invasion to be real.
The rest of the story has gone down into the history books and the event will long be remembered as a milestone of radio's proven impact on American listeners.
 But in modern times, creative radio, especially radio theater - "Theater of the Mind" - has all but dried up and gone away. Replacing the Golden Days of radio are the corporate days of radio; the big business of making more, spending less and doing anything but unsettling the apple cart of success with untried programming.In the Texas Rio Grande Valley, apparently, old time radio is not completely dead.
The latest word on the street there is that an invading force of little green men from Mars are expected to begin arriving just before sunset Friday night, October 31st.
“We have it on good word from invasion insiders that all systems are go for Friday night’s invasion,” reports Love 95.3 and Alternative 92.7 station manager Carla Land. The station is staging an orginal adaptation of the original adaptation of Orson Wells radio classic.
 "Istead of trying to scare people to death, we hope to make them laugh - but not quite till they're dead," she adds.
“It would be old hat to simply schedule the original radio show over the local airwaves,” explains Land, pointing out that the originally- mastered show offers poor sound quality in spite of modern sound technology efforts to clean it up. “So we thought we would do something no one else is willing to do, create our own adaptation, enlist the aid of local actors and community leaders, and people on the street and stage a similar invasion here in the Rio Grande Valley.”
“Original radio drama is all but dead,” cites Jerry Wilson, station promotions whiz, who says putting together such a major production is demanding in both time and effort. “But what large, corporate radio station is going to do it. As independent broadcasters, we feel completing such a task falls upon us if it’s ever to be done again.”
But don’t expect the drama-oriented “scare tactics” employed by the original broadcast to be the theme for the night.
“Unless you have Orson Wells for a narrator, or Richard Burton (as with the Moody Blues musical rock-opera rendition of the famous radio play), you must decide to attempt a very tongue-in-cheek type local production instead. And I think that’s what we’ve done,” she adds.
On Friday night (5pm on Love 95.3 and at 6pm on Alternative 92.7), the War of the Worlds Rio Grande Valley adaptation will air featuring a number of familiar voices from throughout the area. While the radio station isn’t revealing all the actors and voices involved in the local production, they guarantee you will hear the voices of many of your friends and neighbors.
 “We’ve enlisted a lot of local talent,” says Land, “including community leaders, business owners, radio personalities and even people on the street from all across the Valley. Some of them didn’t know what we were doing until after we recorded their unrehearsed parts.”
Producers admit the local production is a parody of the original drama.
“That was our intent. This program isn’t designed to scare you as much as it to make you laugh. Halloween is about having fun, and for one hour this Friday, you’ll be able to tune in the radio and hear local people having fun,” she reports.
There are two versions of the local War of the Worlds Production. While the actors and scripting remains much the same in the two versions, the music will contrast greatly.
Listeners of the jazz station, Love 95.3 wouldn’t appreciate a musical score to the production that included Ozzy Osbourne. But listeners of Alternative 92.7, the other station operated by Alternative Broadcasting from South Padre Island, will rock out to an entirely different musical score to the production.
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