Holbrook: Mark Twain’s words ring true today
Hal Holbrook said he’s performed his one-man “Mark Twain Tonight” show so long – since 1954 – that he’s seen the evolution of black America that would thrill the 19th-century humorist, whose “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” was an anti-discrimination argument cloaked in boyhood adventure.
“I’ve been doing this 56 or 57 years – ever since I wrote and performed it for a college master project,” said Holbrook, now 86. “When I started touring through the South, it was before the civil rights movement when (Alabama safety commissioner) Bull Connor was turning police dogs and water hoses on peaceful protestors.”
Twain was known for his strong, if sometimes satirical, stand against racial bigotry in his writings, said Holbrook, an activist for human rights.
“The young black men and women who come to the show these days are so different. They have a confidence, a smartness, a refusal to be put down that is a wonderful affirmation of what is possible in a country when people approach each other with respect. They have taken their rightful place in mainstream society and feel comfortable there,” Holbrook said during a phone conversation from a recent stop in Baton Rouge, La. “It makes me hopeful that we can also get through all the terrible anger, all the hatred, all the lying and accusations we see in today’s politics and media that are tearing our country apart.”
Meanwhile, Holbrook said, the ever-prescient Twain had something sharp to say about politics, the media, public service and revered institutions like banks and churches that’s remarkably as true today at it was in his supposedly less-civilized frontier era. And Holbrook reworks his show when old quotes fit new events.
“I’ve done enough research through Twain’s writings to realize that this man who lived more than 100 years ago wouldn’t be terribly shocked by what’s happening today,” Holbrook said with a rueful laugh. “I’ve found a quote about the ‘limitless rottenness and theft perpetrated by financial institutions.’ I’ve found quotes about the ‘moron quality’ of politicians and the ‘propaganda’ and ‘pandering’ of the press. Twain shows that, too often, we are just going around in circles.”
Holbrook, who won a Tony Award on Broadway with this show in 1966 and an Emmy for the CBS broadcast of it in 1967, will bring “Mark Twain Tonight” to Wichita at 7:30 p.m. Saturday for a performance at the Orpheum Theatre. It will be one of only 20 such performances he’ll make this year.
He played the elderly version of heartthrob Robert Pattinson in “Water for Elephants.” He plays Katey Sagal’s dad on TV’s “Sons of Anarchy.” And he’s signed to shortly begin filming Stephen Spielberg’s “Lincoln,” due out in 2012 with Daniel Day-Lewis in the title role.
And he’s alternating “Twain” performances with a national book tour for the first of two volumes of his autobiography, “Harold,” which came out in October. The second volume will showcase his partnership with wife Dixie Carter, remembered for TV’s “Designing Women,” who died last year at age 70.
Holbrook also is coming to Wichita to reconnect with a college buddy, Richard Welsbacher, retired longtime head of the Wichita State University theater department.
“Dick is my dear friend. He was a wonderful actor – the best in our school,” Holbrook says.
This story was originally published November 10, 2011 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Holbrook: Mark Twain’s words ring true today."