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“In the morning at Camp David, I ran the tape of the movie ABC is running on Nov. 20. It’s called ‘The Day After’ in which Lawrence, Kansas, is wiped out in a nuclear war with Russia. It is powerfully done, all $7 million worth. It is very effective and left me greatly depressed.”

If the idea of a sitting president altering their foreign policy based on a TV show sounds preposterous to you – and given that the current president of the United States is a former reality television star, it probably shouldn’t – consider Ronald Reagan’s diary entry, above, dated October 10th, 1983.

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Reagan would go on to add: “My own reaction: we have to do all we can to have a deterrent and to see that there is never a nuclear war.”

The Day After was the kind of network TV movie “event” that would be unheard of today, complete with a special warning to children and a post-programme live debate panel which included, among others, Carl Sagan and Henry Kissinger. A record-setting 100 million American viewers watched it over Thanksgiving, and it would go on to win 12 Emmys.