Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious:
The Making of 'Mary Poppins
The Pride of the Yankees (1942)
There’s often a suspension of disbelief required when viewing a biopic, be it accepting Cate Blanchett as Bob Dylan or that Max Schreck was an actual vampire. On occasion we are asked to look past a decidedly older actor depicting a character in their youth, such as James Stewart in The Glenn Miller Story and Kevin Spacey in Beyond the Sea. The payoff for this pact is a mature performance from an accomplished actor. So it is with The Pride of the Yankees, in which a 41-year-old Gary Cooper portrays baseballer Lou Gehrig from his college days onwards. One year after his Oscar-winning role as Sergeant York, Cooper turned in another performance in which he barely strikes a false note… though baseball purists might disagree.
Like Sergeant York, The Pride of the Yankees opens with a foreword linking its hero to the heroes currently doing battle in World War II. After an opening in which Cooper is fortunately not called upon to portray the 11-year-old Gehrig, the film fast forwards to Columbia University where the baseballer is earning a reputation as ‘the Babe Ruth of the colleges’. Yet his domineering mother insists her son become an engineer, a demand he acquiesces to until she gets sick. Signing with the New York Yankees to pay for his mother's medical bills, Gehrig spends much of his first season on the bench before eventually getting the chance to play alongside the real Babe Ruth. However it’s another encounter during his debut game that dominates the film’s proceedings.
Which is just as well, for apparently it was more difficult passing Cooper off as a baseball player than as a college student. One of the more legendary stories involves the filmmakers printing the word YANKEES backwards on his uniform, making him run to third base instead of first and then flipping the film over so the righthanded actor looked like he was batting lefthanded. Regardless, casting Gehrig’s teammates as themselves adds a nice touch of authenticity, particularly Babe Ruth, whose ease in front of the camera and natural charm helps explain the affection he still commands.
For the most part though, The Pride of the Yankees focuses on the love affair between Lou and Eleanor. Following their courtship from the day she dubs him Tanglefoot, the depiction of the couple’s romance underscores the notion that their honeymoon never ended, awkward wrestling matches and an interfering mother-in-law notwithstanding. Only an interlude by specialty dancers Veloz and Yolanda threatens to kill the mood. Well, that and a fatal disease.
That disease remains unnamed in the film but thenceforth, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis was commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
as Lou Gehrig
as himself
as himself
as himself
Lou and Eleanor did not meet during his first game with the Dodgers. They met eight years later at a party.
Rather than marrying in Lou’s home with family and friends in attendance, Lou and Eleanor eloped to avoid a confrontation with his mother.
Biopic co-opts the Babe Ruth/Johnny Sylvester story to include Lou Gehrig. In this version, the sick child is named Billy and is promised one homerun from the Babe and two from Lou during a World Series. The only time this happened was in the 1932 World Series against the Chicago Cubs when Babe and Lou both hit two homeruns in Game 3. However, the opposing team in the film are the St Louis Cardinals, who played against the Yankees in both the 1926 and 1928 World Series.
It was Eleanor who was told about Lou’s dire prognosis and chose not to inform him, not (as depicted in the biopic), the other way around.
Biopic makes no mention of Lou Gehrig’s starring role in Rawhide, which was filmed in 1938 during the baseball off-season.