By Shirley Gilbert
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Joel Butler as Mark Twain with his mom Elaine Butler
There he was, one of the 19th century greatest orators, in the flesh, twirling his ever-present cigar, his mustache occasionally twitching, dressed in his favorite three-piece white suit, red string tie, his white hair somewhat askew.
He paced the front of the stage, drank water occasionally to wet his whistle and launched into some of his most humorous prose in that characteristic Southern accent about a bad boy named Jim and the treachery of San Francisco weather.
He told many of his favorite stories, as only Twain can do, peppered with quotes that are still with us today. Quotes like: “Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I’ve done it thousands of times.” And: “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco. We all grumble about the weather, but nothing is done about it.”
Oh and, as is his custom, he hit on a familiar Twain theme — the treachery of politicians: “Suppose,” he said, “you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
He ended his 30-minute monologue with excerpts of a speech he made on the occasion of a tribute to him on his 70th birthday in 1905 at the Delmonico Restaurant in New York.
He concluded that tribute with this: “I am seventy, seventy, and would nestle in the chimney-corner and smoke my pipe, and read my book and take my rest, wishing well in all affection, and that when you in your turn shall arrive at pier No.70, you may step aboard your waiting ship with a reconciled spirit, and lay your course toward the sinking sun with a contented heart.”
But much to our surprise Twain, who has been dead over 100 years, turned out to be Bay Area actor Joel Butler. You may have seen Joel recently as Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol at Stage 1 or Frankenstein’s Creature in Frankenstein at Broadway West. In March, his next role will be Sir Studley in Once Upon A Mattress at Stage 1. When Joel isn’t acting he’s busy with his day job — children’s librarian at the Saratoga Library.
The short and the tall: Joel gets flowers from Shirley Gilbert for a fabulous performance.
Genevieve Angelides opened the Evening with Mark Twain and welcomed the 90 members of the audience. She gave a five-year history of AAUW Fremont Branch’s involvement in One Book, One Community from our first foray with Three Cups of Tea to this year’s focus on humor and Lots of Laughter. She acknowledged some special guests: Joel’s mother Elaine Butler, who came from San Francisco to see her son turn into Mark Twain. It was fun seeing her eyes shine with pride as her son brought Mark Twain to life. Library work runs in the family as Elaine is also a librarian. There were also nine members of the Castro Valley AAUW in the audience as well as many members of the California Retired Teachers Association.
Shirley Gilbert then gave a 20-minute talk on Mark Twain’s life, peppering it with many quotes and phrases the first king of comedy and oratory is famous for. The audience learned about Samuel Langhorne Clemens’s — alias Mark Twain — early life in Hannibal Missouri. His father died when he was just 11 and he had to go to work at an early age. He tried a variety of occupations before settling on journalism.
That started Twain on his prolific writing adventures. By the time of his death he had published more than 30 books 4,000 newspaper and magazines articles and written his most beloved classics The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
The One Book, One Community committee responsible for a fabulous performance.
What made Twain so remarkable in his day is that there is probably no other author in the history of literature who equaled his success as an orator.
The evening ended with flowers and a special tribute to Margery Leonard, co-chair of the One Book, One Community leadership team, whose inspiration and hard work made the magic evening possible. She researched and organized a lot of the material that Joel and Shirley used in their presentations. “We can’t have a year of Lots of Laughter,” said Margery, “without singling out the greatest humorist of them all — Mark Twain.”
And to think he came to Fremont to delight us all!
There are more pictures in the MARK TWAIN ALBUM