Mark Twain Tonight!

Hal Holbrook returns to his Tony Award-winning role in Mark Twain Tonight! for a three-week Broadway engagement. Holbrook’s journey playing Mark Twain began in 1954 when he played in small towns all across America. In 1959 Mark Twain Tonight! opened off-Broadway and immediately became a huge critical and audience success, winning an Obie Award, the Vernon Rice Award, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. The show debuted on Broadway in 1966, winning the Drama Critics’ Circle Award and a Best Actor Tony Award for Holbrook. In 1967, CBS-TV presented a 90-minute version of the play which was seen by an audience of 22 million people.

The show made a return to Broadway in 1977. A 1985 tour began in London and ended in New Dehli. On January 17, 2004, he marked his 2000th performance in Germantown, Tennessee. Mark Twain Tonight! has become perhaps the longest-running show in theatre history. Holbrook adds to his Twain material every year, editing and changing it to fit the times and has mined over 15 hours of Twain with more coming all the time. He has no set program – he chooses material as he goes along.