Family Theater: The Prince and the Pauper

Family Theater presents Carl Vignon, Roddy MacDowell and Terry Kilburn. From Hollywood, the mutual network in cooperation with Family Theater presents Roddy MacDowell and Terry Kilburn in Mark Twain's The Prince and the Pop. To introduce the drama, your host Carl Vignon.

Thank you Gene. The beloved American author Mark Twain had this to say once about a story he had written. It may have happened, it may not have happened, but it could have happened. It may be that the wise and the learned believed it in the old days.

It may be that only the unlearned and the simple loved it and gave credence to it. Well, it may be that I am unlearned and simple then, for I loved his story when I first read it and I still give credence to it today.

And I know that I am not the only one. For millions of readers have acclaimed this warm, human, and tender classic of a boy of royal blood in one of a beggar's family who proved that not only our appearance is off deceptive, but that the quality of mercy becomes a thrown at monarch better than his

crown. Here then, with Roddy McDowell as the royal Edward of England and Terry Kilburn as Tom can't hit a beggar lad, we bring you Mark Twain's famous story, The Prince and the Popper. The ancient city of London on an autumn day of the 16th century, two boys were born.

All England spoke of one of these babies, for he was Edward Tudor, Prince of Wales, some One day to be Crown King, but there was no talk about the other baby Tom Cantay, except among the family of Poppers whom he had just come to trouble with his presence.