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Twenty-first Century Twain  
 

About the show creators

Alan Kitty (Playwright/Mark Twain) Has been impersonating Mark Twain since 1979. He is well-known for his creative interpretations of many character roles over the years, in touring productions of "A Delicate Balance," "Come Blow Your Horn," "Speed The Plow," "Dead Wrong," "The Cruicible," "Murder in the Cathedral," "Twilight of the Golds," and dozens of other modern works. He has been praised for his unique approaches to character leads in musical classics such as "Damn Yankees," "L'il Abner," Godspell," "Bye-Bye Birdie," and many others. As a playwright, he has penned musical and non-musical plays, including "Bing," "Elective Behaviors," "Mark Twain is Alive and Well," and "Landscape." For television, he was commissioned to write a three-part series "Reel Exposure" which aired during the early years of Cable. Kitty is also slated to direct "Offsides," a new work for theatre set to premiere in the fall.

Charles Messina (Director) Mr. Messina, a playwright, dramaturge known for his deconstructionist direction of Cirque Jacqueline and Mercury also directed the big budget musical Be My Love, written by Richard Vetere, about the life of singer Mario Lanza, which was produced by Sonny Grosso and Phil Ramone. It premiered at The Tillis Center in Oct 2007. Messina has also directed the off-Broadway shows Rockaway Boulevard by Richard Vetere, The Accidental Pervert by Andrew Goffman, and Art Metrano's Accidental Comedy. For the big screen, Messina has written They're Just My Friends, which was released in Fall 2006 and starred Lord Jamar, Malik Yoba, and Bruce Altman.

 

 

 

WHY MARK TWAIN?

A thousand writers have written hundreds of books about Twain. And we believe the exploration of his place in history has just begun. But if you place a map of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania alongside one of Hannibal, Missouri, you will appreciate something we call the Zen of Juxtaposition. You may also see a reason for Kitty's attraction to the man described as "one of the three things the average nineteenth century person in faraway lands knew about America." (The other two were The Statue of Liberty and Wall Street).

Look at a map of the Missouri River around Hannibal, MO. You will see Jackson Island - fictionalized in "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn." A topographic map will also reveal "Lover's Leap." (Inside that mountain is the cave where Tom Sawyer and Becky Thacher were trapped and where Injun Joe died).

Now look at a map of the Susquehanna River around Harrisburg, PA. You will note several islands that might remind you of Jackson. A topographical map will also reveal a bluff, just north of Harrisburg. It is of similar shape and size to the bluff that lay just beyond and above the village of Hannibal. Both enchanted any boy intent on exploring distant lands as Robin Hood or a pirate.

Samuel Clemens was raised about the same distance from those Hannibal landmarks as was Alan Kitty in Harrisburg more than a century later.

The geographic and topographic similaries of the two locations are uncanny. So is the relative distance of the two boyhood homes from their respective rivers. No wonder Alan Kitty chose Twain as the perfect subject of impersonation.