(Credits: Far Out / YouTube Still)
Thu 9 October 2025 1:30, UK
Across his fascinating career, Val Kilmer played some truly exceptional characters.
He’s one of the few men to have embodied Bruce Wayne in live action, playing the “Caped Crusader” in Batman Forever. His surprise appearance as Tom ‘Iceman’ Kazansky was an unexpected emotional highlight of Top Gun: Maverick, drawing on not only the first film, but also Kilmer’s own troubled history.
Kilmer always had a knack for portraying real people. His brilliant turn as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone’s The Doors is still considered one of the best performances never to bag an Oscar. He also played gunslinger Doc Holliday in the underrated western Tombstone and even voiced Moses in the DreamWorks animated gem The Prince of Egypt. But if you’re after his personal favourite portrayal of a historical figure, you’ll have to look beyond the big screen.
In 2012, the former pin-up starred in a one-man show he had written about the life and times of Mark Twain. Known for creating the classic American characters Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, Twain was also a top-notch humorist, spouting many famous quotes and observations that have since passed into common rhetoric. He’s also had about a billion other quotes attributed to him, to the point where, if you believe the Internet, he and Oscar Wilde coined just about every famous phrase ever spoken.
Citizen Twain, as it was called, began as a film project Kilmer had been working on for almost a decade prior. That level of dedication takes real passion. As the star explained to Grigware, finally getting to step into Twain’s shoes was very much worth the wait.
“I’ll tell you very honestly it’s so gratifying to play a genius and have it be received so warmly, because his mind is so unique and I would say his love, it’s almost like an overwhelming love of America,” he said.
Adding, “He loves everybody, the lowliest river rat and the laziest maid back in the kitchen… he was at Andrew Carnegie’s mansion. He remembered everybody’s name and whoever had a great story, whoever needed help, he was really our writer, the whole country’s writer… and it’s not me trying to sell you, to sell tickets to the play. It’s who he is; it’s very real.”
The one-man show played in Los Angeles’ Masonic Lodge in 2012. A version was filmed and later released as Cinema Twain, which also served as Kilmer’s directorial debut. Sadly, the health issues that would eventually cost Kilmer the ability to speak forced him to cancel the show in 2014, the year that marked a significant downturn in his ability to perform. He did get the chance to play Twain on screen in the 2014 film Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn, which hopefully brought him some comfort.
Playing Twain clearly meant a lot to Kilmer. He put the role right up there with his favourite ever performances. He’s such a fascinating character both in isolation and in the context of the evolution of Americana. Not everyone could have taken him on, but Kilmer was just the man for the job.
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