Classic Radio Spotlight: Orson Welles, Vol. 2

Enjoy eight hours of classic radio episodes starring the incomparable Orson Welles and his friends. Armed with the nickname “The Boy Genius,” Orson Welles graduated from the New York stage to expand his creative talents in the radio industry, hoping to use the audio medium to promote his stage ventures. Welles followed the edict that most stage actors applied—he played roles in hundreds of radio dramas produced by advertising agencies and the radio networks. After creating a minor panic in the minds of radio listeners with his 1938 War of the Worlds broadcast, Welles attracted the attention of a movie studio that offered the actor the spotlights of tinsel town … resulting in Citizen Kane. Making the move to California, Welles continued to appear on radio programs, now established as a Hollywood actor, and made numerous guest appearances on variety, comedy, and dramatic programs. In 1941, and again in 1946, Welles starred in a chilling story titled “The Hitch-Hiker,” scripted by Lucille Fletcher, which thirteen years later was adapted into a television episode of The Twilight Zone. In the early fifties, when Welles was momentarily “blacklisted,” the actor moved to England and narrated the radio program The Black Museum and starred in The Lives of Harry Lime, a sequel to the Carol Reed classic The Third Man, now regarded as one of the one hundred best movies ever made. This collection of Orson Welles radio dramas are among his very best, and we hope you’ll enjoy them for years to come!