Moviegoers take their seats in preparation to view The

They celebrated the 25th anniversary of Lawrence being the center of the television universe.

Thursday night, dozens of people at Liberty Hall watched a screening of the TV movie “The Day After,” mostly shot and set in Lawrence, a quarter century after it aired on ABC the night of Nov. 20, 1983.

Sam Dixon, a longtime Lawrence resident and insurance business owner, remembers showing up as an extra for several scenes in the Cold War movie about a devastating nuclear strike.

“It was like a vacation. Everybody was all excited about it,” Dixon said.

To his knowledge, he never made the final cut, though.

The Watkins Community Museum of History organized Thursday’s event along with Kyle Harvey, an Australian doctoral student who is studying film and politics.

“It impacted almost everybody who saw it in the country,” said David Longhurst, Lawrence’s mayor at the time.

Longhurst participated in a panel discussion about the movie after the screening. Director Nicholas Meyer, producer Robert Papazian, actor Jeff East and Lawrence casting director Jack Wright were also involved in the discussion.

Harvey, who attends Macquarie University in Sydney, will spend the next week interviewing Lawrence residents who were involved in the film or their reactions to it. Participants are encouraged to contact him at 841-0314 or kyle.harvey@mq.edu.au.

Nearly 100 million viewers tuned in that night.

“People were interested in the film, interested in being in the film and seeing themselves and their town and their house, their street on the screen,” Harvey said.

Several Lawrence residents said it was a memorable time in the city’s history.

“We still were fearful of an atomic war at the time,” Dixon said.