Ann Robinson, the red-haired actress who was memorably menaced by Martians in the spectacular 1953 sci-fi classic The War of the Worlds, has died. She was 96.
Robinson died Sept. 26 at her home in Los Angeles, her granddaughter, Tori Bravo, told The Hollywood Reporter. Her death had not been publicly revealed until now.
Born in Hollywood, Robinson had broken into the movies as a stunt performer and was an inexperienced contract player at Paramount Pictures when she auditioned for producer and effects wiz George Pal and then cast as library science teacher Sylvia Van Buren in War of the Worlds.
In the Oscar-winning film, based on the H.G. Wells’ 1898 novel, Sylvia and Pacific Tech professor Clayton Forrester (Gene Barry) try to figure out a way to defeat Martians who have landed in a small town outside Los Angeles and all over the planet, employing a fantastic heat-ray to inflict widespread destruction.
“The nations of the world mobilize their armed might rushing to defend the Earth against the unknown weapon of the super race from the Red Planet!” the narrator on the movie trailer exclaims. “Is there nothing that can stop the Martians’ death machines?”
