It's doubtful whether there is an English-speaking person anywhere in the world who does not have, at least, a passing acquaintance with Mark Twain. A self-educated boy who left home at the age of 13 to find his way in the world, Twain (or rather Samuel Langhorn Clemens) was eventually awarded honorary Doctor of Letters degrees from both Yale and Oxford.  You might say he found his way.

 

Perth's BarnDoor Productions is marking the centennial of Twain's death with a very special production.  Producing Director David  Jacklin is digging deep into his own past to revive a show he created 33 years ago.  Mark Twain's Patent Scrapbook is a one-man tour of the life and writings of America's most beloved author, a show that goes from his pre-Civil War childhood on the banks of the Mississippi to his late-life thoughts on humanity and death.

 

The show takes its name from one of Twain's many inventions, a patented self-sticking scrapbook which he often joked was his most successful book. Jacklin finds it much easier to play the 70-year old Twain this time around.  For one thing, the makeup takes nowhere near the two hours that it did 33 years ago.  For another, the passage of time has given him a much greater connection with Twain's humour and philosophy.  Although born and raised in a slave state, Twain, throughout his writings, always wrote honestly and openly in favour of equality and freedom for all -- views which were not entirely popular in 19th century America and caused many of his books to be banned or censored.  Ironically, in today's politically correct era, Twain is again often banned or censored for those same views, because the honest way in which he wrote about his country's inherent racism is now confused with the very racism he is criticising.

 

Throughout his life, Twain always approached his writing with a sense of humour shaped by the rough and rugged frontier life he led through his youth and by his natural cynicism.  He is well-known for his ability to turn a phrase: "She was not quite what you would call refined. She was not quite what you would call unrefined. She was the sort of person who keeps a parrot." And most famously, his telegram to a newspaper on reading his own obituary in it: "The report of my death has been grossly exaggerated."

 

Twain spent many years speaking on the lecture circuit -- what we would now call the stand-up comedy circuit.  His comic genius brought the house down wherever he went -- except one town in Kansas, where he performed to dead silence, despite pulling out every sure-fire bit he could.  At the end of the lecture, a weathered old Kansas farmer shook his hand and said: "Mister Twain, funniest stuff I ever heerd.  'Twas all I could do to keep from laughin' right out in meetin'."  Jacklin wishes to ensure today's audiences that "laughin' right out in meetin'" is acceptable.

 

Mark Twain's Patent Scrapbook is a delightfully entertaining, and occasionally thought-provoking evening, providing a look through some clippings from Twain's remarkable life, as presented by one of the region's most noted performers.

 

Mark Twain's Patent Scrapbook will have two area performances this weekend, Friday, May 21 at St. James Anglican Church Hall, sponsored by Arts Carleton Place and Saturday, May 22 at Perth & District Collegiate Auditorium, sponsored by The Friends of the Full Circle Theatre.  For information on the Carleton Place performance, call 613 257 2031 and for the Perth performance, call 613 267 1884.

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David Jacklin as Mark Twain performs Mark Twain's Patent Scrapbook May 21 in Carleton Place and May 22 in Perth.  The one-man show is a revival of a production he first performed 33 years ago, brought back to the stage for the 100th anniversary of Twain's death.