‘War of the Worlds’ radio show on tonight

Orson Welles

(AP) – Martians will land again tonight. Seventy-one years ago Orson Welles pulled a fast one on his radio audience.

It was his idea of a pre-Halloween joke. He and his Mercury Theater on the Air altered H.G. Wells’ classic “The War of the Worlds” to make it sound like an urgent news broadcast, reporting that Martians were landing on Earth.

Now, to mark the anniversary, a recording of the broadcast will be streamed tonight on the Internet at http://waroftheworldstribute.com/. It starts at the same moment across the country: 8 p.m. Eastern, 7 p.m. Central, 6 p.m. Mountain and 5 p.m. Pacific.

The “War of the Worlds” broadcast is being sponsored by the producers of an upcoming Zac Efron movie called “Me and Orson Welles.”