I regard Mark Twain as one of my personal heroes mainly due to the many amazing talks and essays he penned throughout his career in addition to the novels he’s most famous for. A lot of my views on life, people, and what it means to be a good man have been influenced by Twain’s writings. He’s definitely someone I’d travel back in time for the opportunity to meet and chat with if it were possible, and with this DVD it kind of is possible.

Actor Hal Holbrook has been portraying Mark Twain since his college days taking his show on the road at the age of 29 and then continuing to perform the show throughout a long and busy career in both film and TV. At one point he even performed for President Eisenhower and he still tours the country performing his one man show as Twain to this day.

This DVD was particularly interesting to me for several reasons: First, I had never seen Hal Holbrook’s show in its entirety, though I’ve long known that it’s probably what he’s best known for. Second, this particular CBS special was performed and recorded a mere five months before I was born in 1967 so watching it was, as I said, kind of like going back in time in more ways than one. Third, I’ve long heard of how convincing Holbrook is in his portrayal of Twain due to his years of study and research on what Twain was like and what he wrote. Indeed, watching this DVD it was very easy to forget that the man I was watching was not Twain himself and the illusion was only broken during the occasional extreme closeups where you could recognize Holbrook’s face underneath the makeup. Holbrook is said to have memorized upwards of 14 hours of Twain’s original writings and the show he puts on consists entirely of Twain’s words, though Holbrook modifies his selections based on the times and the issues of the day making each show seem different. One of the more amazing things about this DVD is the fact that everything in it holds up well 37 years later and still feels as relevant and insightful today as it probably did back in 1967, or back when Twain originally wrote the words himself.

The quality of the recording does vary throughout the show, but considering the age and the media of the time period it’s been cleaned up remarkably well. The audio can get a little fuzzy in some segments, but overall it’s probably better than should be expected all things considered. The DVD doesn’t have much in the way of extras and launches straight into the show without pausing at a menu. The only extras included are a small text-only bio on Hal Holbrook and a list of all the awards he’s received over the years for his portrayal of Twain. It would have been nice to see more supplemental material. Perhaps something involving Hal speaking on his many years of performing as Twain could have been done.

Still, the show itself is amazing and is a must see for any fan of Mark Twain who wonders what it might have been like to see him during his time touring the country as an orator. The next time Holbrook brings his act to town I’m going to have to make arrangements to see it.