The Free World Theatre Radio Program

Background

While clearly at home with the hundreds of horror, mystery and comedic plays he penned over the years, Arch Oboler had an equal--if not greater--passion for inspiring, thought-provoking, patriotic prose; and he was a both eloquent and persuasive anti-war proponent throughout his life. His Everyman's Theater, Plays for Americans, and To The President series were riveting fare in both the run-up to, and America's involvement in, World War II. His Free World Theatre over The Blue Network was equally compelling.

No less a man of Letters than Thomas Mann summed up Oboler's war efforts in the introduction to a set of plays compiled by Hollywood Writers Mobilization containing the collected works of playwrights Arch Oboler and Stephen Longstreet during the early years of the war effort:

"What they offer is propaganda in the best and purest sense of the word, Propaganda--not for war. It is thoroughly un-American to glorify war as has been done in certain countries, and to blame the outbreak of the war on the Pope, the Jews, capital, Communism, Mssrs. Churchill and Roosevelt, and I don't know what else. To repeat: this is not propaganda for war. At most it is propaganda for a war to which we were not in the least inclined but which was forced upon us in order to prevent evil from gaining sole mastery on earth, and which we must wage to the end for the sake of mankind's honor and for the preservation of our own free human lives . . . One can propagate good as well as evil. . . . Now then the great advantage of this book is that the propaganda which it offers cannot and will not be so described [as evil] by anyone in a hostile sense. Its propaganda is so free of partisanship, offense and challenge, it is so natural and pro-human that hardly anyone will be tempted to utter the disapproving cry: "Propaganda!" It is good propaganda insofar as it is effective, absorbing and entertaining. And it is good propaganda insofar as it awakes our hearts which are so much inclined to drowse in indifference, and summon them to hate evil and to believe in a better world as the fruit of victory."

Needless to say, propaganda is propaganda, now matter how one characterizes it. But the very point of Thomas Mann's intro was to highlight the dichotomy between The Office of War Information's desire to enlist the cooperation with the great radio networks of the era and the nature of War propaganda itself:

• What is 'good propaganda' ?
• What is 'bad propaganda' ?
• When is wartime propaganda best serve humanity?
• When does propaganda do a disservice to humantity?

From the January 10th 1943 edition of the Trenton Evening Times:

     World leaders in the allied cause will place their war and peace aims before the American people in a new dramatic series to be launched over the Blue network, beginning Feb. 14.
     Statements from high ranking figures in the political and fighting fronts will be interpreted by the nation's outstanding script writers working in collaboration with the Office of War Information and will be presented weekly in dramatic form.
     Headed by Arch Oboler, noted radio playwright, the "Free World Theatre" will make its debut as a Sunday feature and will be heard for twenty-six weeks over the Blue, from 6:05 to 6:30 p.m., EWT.
     Each play will be written around especially requested statements from allied leaders with the statements forming the nucleus of the drama.
     President Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Josef Stalin, are among those who already have been contacted and requested to contribute their expressions on any issue of the war or the peace to come.
     Others who have responded to the idea include Aldous Huxley, Thomas Mann, H.G. Wells, Wendell Willkie, General DeGalle, John Masaryk, General Smuts, Lin Yutang, Stewart Chase, Cordell Hull, Madame Chang Kai-shek, General MacArthur and Henry Wallace.
     As statements are received from these personalities, Oboler, as director of the series, will assign them to various top members of the Screen Writers and Radio Writers Guild, who will create dramatizations around them.
     Casts of the plays will be selected by Oboler from a list of Hollywood's most famous stars.  The idea for the "Free World Theatre" was conceived by the Office of War Information and was suggested to Oboler at the conclusion of the recent "To the President" series presented by the writer-director over the Blue.

From the February 20th 1943 edition of the Auburn Citizen-Advertiser: 

Series Derivatives:

Notes on Provenances:

The most helpful provenances were newspaper listings.

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