THE WAR tells the stories of citizens from four geographically distributed American towns — Waterbury, Connecticut; Mobile, Alabama; Sacramento, California; and the tiny farming town of Luverne, Minnesota. These four communities stand in for — and could represent — any town in the United States that went through the war's four devastating years.

In creating THE WAR the filmmakers spent six years traveling to the four towns, meeting with veterans and their families; scoured hundreds of archives and looked at tens of thousands of documents and photographs and drew on material, both still and moving, from around the world.

The video clips below take you behind-the-scenes of the making of THE WAR, providing insights from the on-screen participants in the series, a look at the production process — including sound design, editing and music composition  — and thoughts from co-producers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick on the critical importance of creating the series at this time.

		PBS PREVIEWS: THE WAR (26 min) » The half-hour PBS PREVIEWS: THE WAR presents thoughts from co-producers Ken Burns and Lynn Novick on the critical importance of creating this series at this time.  It also provides excerpts from the series, insights from the on-screen participants in the series, and behind-the-scenes looks at the production.
		Ken "reluctant to get into this subject." (1:10) » Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick explain how they and their team selected WWII as the subject of their latest film. This is followed by a short clip from episode one.
		Lynn "Starting this project was intimidating."(2:21) » Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick describe the challenges they faced in assembling thousands of hours of film footage into the finished series.
		Ken "We live in a digital world now" (2:36) » Directors Ken Burns describes the process of collecting the thousands of images and film sequences from hundreds of archives around the world… plus a few personal archives.
		The challenge of sound design (1:50) Almost all of the thousands of hours of film collected for THE WAR arrived with no sound. Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick explain the journey from silence to surround sound.
		Wynton Marsalis on composing music for the film (1:22) » Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick venture into the recording studio with composer Wynton Marsalis and a collection of exceptional musicians as they record the original soundtrack to THE WAR.
		Echoes of War (2:31) » Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick reflect on the meaning of WWII, and why, even after more than six decades, it continues to fascinate America.
		Different Echoes of War II (0:46) » Directors Ken Burns and Lynn Novick reflect on the meaning of WWII, and why, even after more than six decades, it continues to fascinate America.