Richard Thomas Brings American Icon To Life With “Mark Twain Tonight”

Ozark, Billions, The Americans, and The Waltons, will be performing Mark Twain Tonight! at the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Auditorium.

In the lauded one-man show, Thomas channels the spirit and the gusto of the prolific humorist, novelist, and once dubbed “Father of American Literature,” Mark Twain.

Known for legendary novels like The Adventures of Tom Sawyer from 1876, The Prince and the Pauper in 1881, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, written in 1884, the iconic author and beloved essayist is not only a cherished icon of American literature, but he is also famous for being able to capture the nuances and cadences of the authentic Southern voice during a period of post-reconstruction in the South.

Twain also had a strong moral compass guiding readers in most of his novels and was an abolitionist who used Southern themes to explore universal concerns about freedom.

The show, Mark Twain Tonight!, was originally written and produced by Hal Holbrook and has been performed nationally for decades, becoming a staple in the theater community.

The production will be a mix of humor and depth, and as a classic one-man show, Thomas often engages directly with the audience, embodying different characters of Twain’s to deliver sharp social commentary on society and humanity as a whole. The run time is about 90 minutes, and there is no intermission.

The production has run for 63 consecutive years, with over 2300 performances of Mark Twain Tonight! It is likely one of the longest-running shows in theater history. It was developed in a Greenwich Village nightclub in 1956 and ultimately landed on the Ed Sullivan Show.

In 1959, Holbrook opened the show off-Broadway to rave reviews. In 1966, he won the Tony Award, and in 1967, CBS aired a 90-minute special of the show, which was seen by nearly 30 million people.

Richard Thomas is the first and only actor authorized to perform Mark Twain Tonight! since the original, written and produced by Hal Holbrook, and before he retired from the show in 2017.

2025 Theater Hall of Fame inductee, Thomas, was most recently seen on Broadway in Our Town and on tour as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird; however, his rise to fame came in 1972 with a beloved TV show called The Waltons as John-Boy Walton, which won him both an Emmy and a Golden Globe award in 1973 and launched his career in acting.

Thomas has also been nominated for a SAG award for Ozark and The Americans and has been seen in many acclaimed performances on stage, including a revival of The Little Foxes, for which he received a Tony Award nomination.

In Mark Twain Tonight! Thomas does not try to imitate Holbrook’s performance of Twain but instead takes on his own version of Twain for the show, often drawing from Mark Twain’s actual words and instilling a sense of authenticity, warmth, humor, and tradition in the role that remains unique to him while honoring the legacy of Holbrook’s Twain.

For an evening that honors the legacy and rich tapestry of characters and stories told by Mark Twain, book your tickets in advance and be prepared to go back in time to a place full of humor, deft social commentary, and Southern wit, as Richard Thomas channels the spirit of Mark Twain in Mark Twain Tonight!

Mark Twain Tonight!