As in most of her productions, Bogart explained, she started with a question. He turned the H.G. Wells tale about a Martian invasion of Earth into a simulated news broadcast that was so convincing it panicked listeners across the country. War of the Worlds is not a documentary, she insisted. We use the poetic language of the stage.
Many characters are composites or invented outright.
It tells his story, but I can't say it's his life. If not his life, it is, in a way, his movie. War of the Worlds , which has been presented at the Humana Theatre Festival in Louisville, and the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland, is named for the radio broadcast. It is Citizen Kane , though, that is the more direct inspiration. In the play, Welles is given the Kane treatment, the story of his life and work explored as if it were a mystery.