| Mark Twain | |
|---|---|
| Written by | Dayton Duncan Geoffrey C. Ward |
| Directed by | Ken Burns |
| Narrated by | Keith David |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Production | |
| Producers | Pam Tubridy Baucom Ken Burns |
| Running time | 212 minutes |
| Production companies | Florentine Films WETA |
| Original release | |
| Release | January 14, 2002 (2002-01-14) |
Mark Twain is a documentary film on the life ofMark Twain, also known as Samuel Clemens, produced byKen Burns in 2001 which aired on Public Broadcasting System on January 14 and 15, 2002.[1] Burns attempted to capture both the public and private persona of Mark Twain from his birth to his death. The film was narrated byKeith David.[2]
The voice of Mark Twain was provided byKevin Conway and the voice ofOlivia Langdon Clemens was portrayed byBlythe Danner.[2] Other voice work was provided by actorsPhilip Bosco,Carolyn McCormick,Amy Madigan,Cynthia Nixon, and Tim Clark. The film also includes interviews with playwrightArthur Miller,[2] novelist and Twain biographerRon Powers,[3] writerWilliam Styron,[4] poetRussell Banks,[4] historian John Boyer (executive director of theMark Twain House),[5]Harvard University professor Jocelyn Chadwick,[6]Stanford University English literature professor Shelley Fisher Fishkin, comedian and civil rights activistDick Gregory,[4] actorHal Holbrook,[1] animator and actorChuck Jones,[4] and Mark Twain scholarLaura Skandera Trombley.[7]
Mark Twain Legacy Scholar Barbara Schmidt asserts on her website twainquotes.com that someartistic license was taken, resulting in some historical inaccuracies and misrepresentations.[8] She also notes, that some of these errors are the result of the Twain scholarship at time the documentary was made, and that more recent scholarship has revealed some of the factual errors that are in the documentary.[8] Schmidt's website twainquotes.com is widely cited in academic publications on Twain and is highly regarded as an authoritative resource within Twain research.[9]
Film criticCaryn James wrote the following in her review inThe New York Times:
"No writer was ever more sardonic about American culture than Twain, and no filmmaker is more earnest than Ken Burns. InMark Twain that makes for a maddening collision between Twain's ironic sensibility and Mr. Burns's familiar, sentimental style. Twain is forced into the Burns cookie cutter here, complete with the unironic sound ofSweet Betsy from Pike, fiddled relentlessly in the background."[2]