The untold story behind the first great sports film... The Pride of the Yankees: Lou Gehrig, Gary Cooper, and the Making of a Classic
On July 4, 1939, baseball great Lou Gehrig stood in Yankee Stadium and gave a speech that contained the phrase that would become legendary: "I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth."
He died two years later and his fiery widow, Eleanor, wanted nothing more than to keep his memory alive. With her forceful will, she and the irascible producer Samuel Goldwyn quickly agreed to make a film based on Gehrig's life, "The Pride of the Yankees." Goldwyn didn't understand -- or care about -- baseball. For him this film was the emotional story of a quiet, modest hero who married a spirited woman who was the love of his life, and, after a storied career, gave a short speech that transformed his legacy. With the world at war and soldiers dying on foreign soil, it was the kind of movie America needed.
Using original scripts, letters, memos, and other rare documents, Richard Sandomir tells the behind-the-scenes story of how a classic was born. The search to find the actor to play Gehrig; the stunning revelations Eleanor made to the scriptwriter Paul Gallico about her life with Lou; the intensive training Gary Cooper underwent to learn how to catch, throw, and hit a baseball for the first time.
On a warm summer evening, Richard Sandomir led our intimate Clubhouse conversation and brought "The Pride of the Yankees" to life. Listen in...
A Conversation with Watercolor Artist James Fiorentino
"San Francisco Year Zero" with Lincoln Mitchell
"War in the Ring" with John Florio and Ouisie Shapiro
"Doc, Donnie, The Kid, and Billy Brawl" with Chris Donnelly
"The Arena" with Rafi Kohan
"The Cooperstown Casebook" with Jay Jaffe
"Piazza" with author Greg Prince
"Making My Pitch" with Jean Hastings Ardell
"Urban Shocker" with Steve Steinberg
"It Happens Every Spring" with Pulitzer Prize-winner Ira Berkow
"Dinner with DiMaggio" with Dr. Rock Positano and John Positano
"Hank Greenberg in 1938" with Ron Kaplan
"Casey Stengel: Baseball's Greatest Character" with Marty Appel
"The New York Yankees Fans' Bucket List" with Mark Feinsand
"One Nation Under Baseball" with John Florio & Ouisie Shapiro
"42 Faith" with Ed Henry
"Frick: Baseball's Third Commissioner" with John Carvalho
"Will Big League Baseball Survive" with Lincoln Mitchell
"Baseball's Most Baffling MVP Ballots" with Jeremy Lehrman
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