Random Behind-The-Scenes Stories From ‘A League of Their Own,’ Most Rewatchable Sports Movi (17 items)

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  (#1) No One Thought That 'There's No Crying In Baseball!' Would Become A Classic Movie Line

  Decades after audiences first heard Jimmy Duggan scream, "There's no crying in baseball!" the quote remains a fixture in pop culture. However, screenwriters Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel never thought the scene would continue to be quoted years after the film's release.

  The intent of the scene, the screenwriters told ESPNW in 2017, was to show how different the cultures of men's and women's baseball were. "We never said, 'And then there will be this great scene where the coach says, "There's no crying in baseball,"'" Ganz claimed. He added that the line didn't come from knowing that Tom Hanks would be playing the manager; it was in the very first draft of the script, well before the actor had been cast.

  Bitty Schram, who played Evelyn Gardner, the right fielder who breaks down in tears when she is berated by her manager for missing the cutoff man, said that the scene was filmed out of sequence and took numerous takes to get right. "What kind of sucked was that they had to fix my face for the next take because I couldn't look like I'm crying before I'm crying," Schram told ESPNW. The actor admitted she couldn't stand to watch the scene when she went to the film's premiere because "it made me nauseous. All I could see is 'Oh, they pick the take where I look like I was crying before' or 'Tom is great, but look at my f***ing double chin.' That's all I think about."

  Geena Davis said she always thought the line was very funny, but never thought it would become as iconic as it has: "That line is a signature. Right up there with 'Hasta la vista, baby.'"
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  (#2) It's Still Unclear Whether Dottie Dropped The Ball On Purpose

  At the end of the film, Racine wins the World Series after Kit scores the winning run by crashing into her sister at home plate and knocking the ball out of her Dottie's hand. However, years after the film's release, cast members still don't know whether Dottie deliberately dropped the ball in order to allow the younger sister - who tries for years to escape Dottie's shadow - to be the hero.

  Lori Petty, who played Kit, seems to believe her character knocked the ball out of Dottie's hand. "I kicked her *ss!" she declared to The Ringer in 2017.

  Kelly Candaele, one of the creators of the 1987 documentary about the real AAGPBL, and whose mother (Helen Callaghan) and aunt (Marge Callaghan) actually played in the league, sides with Petty. "My mom would never have dropped the ball, ever," he told The Ringer. "I always tell people that. People say, 'Oh, she [Dottie] did it on purpose, isn't that nice and sweet, she let her sister win.' No one would do that!" Candaele added that doing so would betray both Dottie's teammates and her own integrity, and the belief that she would lose on purpose was condescending. "If you knock someone over and knock the ball out, that's baseball."

  Actor Bitty Schram, on the other hand, believes that Dottie did drop the ball on purpose: "I would say subconsciously yes, because she [Dottie] knew how much more it meant to Kit, and she was too good of a player."

  But Geena Davis, who played Dottie, refuses to give any secrets away. She told ESPNW, "I'll say two things about that. Number one: I know the answer. Because it was me, of course, I know the answer. And number two: No, I'm not going to answer that question. I never have, and I never will."
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  (#3) The Auditions Were Actual Baseball Tryouts And Many Prominent Actors Didn't Get Cast Because Of Their Inability To Be Believable As A Player

  In 2017, Robert Greenhut, who was one of the producers on A League of Their Own, told ESPNW that the film was difficult to cast because they were looking for actors who could play baseball. While it might look easy when watching a game on television, the producer admitted, "We all quickly learned how hard it is to throw from first base to third to get somebody out."

  Director Penny Marshall told MLB.com, "There was a big tryout where [the actors] were judged on running, catching, hitting. Throwing is always the hardest for girls because they throw differently. But I would not [audition]... actresses unless they could play ball or were trainable." Reminiscing about the film with Rosie O'Donnell on the latter's television talk show, the director said that there were several good actors who didn't get cast because they couldn't play. One, Marshall remembered, showed up to the tryout wearing ballet slippers.

  Marshall's daughter Tracy Reiner, who ended up being cast as outfielder Betty "Spaghetti" Horn, went to the open tryouts with one of her cousins, even though she had stitches in her mouth from recently getting her wisdom teeth removed. "There were about 2,000 girls auditioning at USC with [former USC baseball coach] Rod Dedeaux, and his coaches and trainers were going to evaluate the girls to see if you were trainable," Reiner recalled to ESPNW. Dedeaux was impressed with Reiner's arm, but she ended up spitting blood because she had popped the stitches in her mouth. When she returned home, she thought her mom would like that Reiner and her cousin had gone to the big casting call. Instead, Marshall's reaction was "[How'd] you two [end up] testing in the Top 20 girls?"

  Geena Davis's audition for the role of catcher Dottie Hinson took place in the director's backyard. "[Marshall] wanted to make sure I could throw a ball, so that happened," Davis told USA Today in 2017. "I threw the ball to her, competently got it to her, she caught it and said, 'OK.' That was the whole audition." However, the actor, who wasn't an athlete growing up, trained rigorously and ended up impressing the actual baseball coaches on the set with her play. "When the coaches would say, 'You have real untapped athletic ability,' it was like, 'Oh, my god, I am coordinated.'" Davis later took up archery and even competed in the US Olympic Trials in 1999.

  Lori Petty claimed that she auditioned eight times for the part of Dottie's younger sister, pitcher Kit Keller. "Every woman in Hollywood was reading for this movie," Petty told The Ringer in 2017. "It was a strong female movie, which, you know, we don’t have now, and we didn’t have in 1991 either. I mean, Marla Maples auditioned, for Christ’s sake. Everyone."

  Among the actors who did make it through the tryouts were Téa Leoni and Janet Jones, both of whom were cast in bit parts as players on the Racine Belles.
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  (#4) Several Of The Characters Were Directly Based On Real People

  The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) was a real league that existed from 1943 to 1954. So it's not a surprise that several of the characters were based on or inspired by real people. 

  Davis's character Dottie Hinson was inspired by Dorothy "Dottie" Kamenshek, who played for the real Rockford Peaches, although she was a left-handed-hitting first baseman, while Davis's Dottie batted right-handed and was a catcher. While the fictional Dottie retired after one season, Kamenshek was a seven-time All-Star and two-time batting champion, and holds the AAGPBL's record for career hits.

  Tom Hanks's character, Jimmy Dugan, was based on baseball Hall of Famers Jimmie Foxx and Hack Wilson, both of whom had their careers shortened at least in part because of their heavy drinking. After his playing career ended, Foxx spent one season (1952) as a manager of the AAGPBL's Fort Wayne Daisies.

  The part of Walter Harvey (played by Garry Marshall), the league founder/candy manufacturer, was based on the man who founded the real AAGPBL: the Chicago Cubs owner/chewing gum manufacturer, Philip K. Wrigley.
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  (#5) Tom Hanks

  • Actor

  In 2012, Penny Marshall told an audience at the Hudson Union Society that Tom Hanks asked to play the part of Jimmy Dugan, the heavy-drinking former MLB star turned reluctant manager of the Rockford Peaches. At the time, Hanks was coming off of two flop films, The 'Burbs and Joe Versus the Volcano.

  Dugan was originally supposed to be a man in his 50s, but Hanks reportedly talked Marshall into making the character younger. The director was worried that a younger Dugan would be too appealing to the audience, so as a compromise Hanks packed on about 30 pounds to make the character more slovenly. "I had to get fat. I had to gain some weight," the actor told Entertainment Tonight in 1992. "I had BBQ pork ribs and enjoyed the desserts of America."
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  (#6) The Film Was Once Meant To Be Produced By 20th Century Fox, With David Anspaugh As The Director

  Marshall had a deal with 20th Century Fox to develop A League of Their Own, but when Joe Roth was named the head of the studio, he asked Marshall to give up the baseball project.

  "That was my fatal error," Roth admitted to the Los Angeles Times in 1991. “Penny was working on Awakenings at the time and, in my haste to get some movies going, I took the project away. I loved the material, but I soon lost confidence in David Anspaugh [Hoosiers], who I’d brought on to direct."

  Unhappy with his choice of director and frustrated about not finding the right actor for the project, Roth ended up putting A League of Their Own into turnaround, allowing Columbia to pick up the project for Marshall to direct when she left Fox for Columbia in 1990.
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  (#7) Demi Moore And Debra Winger Were Both In The Running To Play Dottie

  A League of Their Own could have ended up with a much different cast. When the film was still in development at Fox, Jim Belushi was in line to play the part of Jimmy Dugan. In her memoir, My Mother Was Nuts, Marshall claims the film's original director, David Anspaugh, wanted Sean Young to play Dottie. Marshall's first choice to play Dottie was Demi Moore, but she dropped out of consideration due to her pregnancy.

  With Moore unavailable, Columbia Pictures was eager for Debra Winger and Madonna to play the roles of Dottie and Kit, respectively. In her memoir, Marshall claims that Winger dropped out of the film because she didn't want to work with the famous singer. Moira Kelly actually got cast as Kit, but had to drop out after she was injured while filming The Cutting Edge.

  Anne Ramsay, who ended up playing the role of Rockford first baseman Helen Haley, originally auditioned for the film when Anspaugh was still attached to direct. As Ramsay told ESPNW in 2017, she auditioned again years later, after Marshall had been reunited with the project: 

  I did well in my audition with Penny, but she could not place me. And she just couldn't figure out how to fit me in for one of the roles that were already in the scripts. And I mean, she had me come in at least five times. One time she goes, "Wash off all of your makeup." I walk to the bathroom in the middle of the audition. She was trying to see me differently, fit me somewhere. I could tell she liked me but couldn't figure it out! Then I get a call from the casting department saying that Penny loved me but couldn't figure out where to put me. Then the casting agent says, "Penny is going to write a role so that you can be in the film."

  While Lori Petty ended up winning the role of Kit, Schram was one of the other actors to audition for that part. "I sat there thinking, 'I'm not right for this,'" she told ESPNW. "But I read for it and wasn't very good. So they then say, 'Hey, we'll have you read for this other role.' And that was for Evelyn, the one that cried. Then I did it, and I knew I nailed it. In my heart and mind, I was like, 'I'm going to get this role.'" Schram was right; she was cast as right fielder Evelyn Gardner.

  Like Anne Ramsay, Megan Cavanagh originally auditioned for the film when Fox was still the studio involved and Anspaugh was set to direct. The actor, who ended up playing the role of second baseman Marla Hooch, described the unusual callback she was part of after Marshall returned to the project:

  They asked all the actresses to be prepared to read other roles; it was a group audition. At this time, Debra Winger was the part of Dottie - not Geena Davis. So it was Debra and Lori Petty. I got invited to this audition with women who had already been cast in the movie, so that was pretty exciting... As I was leaving the audition, Rosie O'Donnell [who was already cast for the role of Doris Murphy] followed me out and said, "Listen, you're the best Marla we've seen so far."

  O’Donnell herself read for multiple roles before being cast as third baseman Doris Murphy.
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  (#8) No, Tom Hanks's Long Bathroom Break Wasn't Real

  The scene where a drunken Dugan stumbles into the locker room and proceeds to take a long pee lasts approximately 53 seconds. But Hanks wasn't really taking a leak.

  Instead, Marshall stood just out of camera range with a hose and a bucket to simulate the sound of the action.
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  (#9) A Cow Actually Gave Birth During The Filming Of One Scene

  When baseball scout Ernie Capadino (Jon Lovitz) comes to the family barn to try and recruit Dottie, he yells, "Will you shut up!" at a cow whose loud mooing was interrupting the scout's sales pitch.

  The line was evidently ad-libbed. But what the actor didn't realize was that the cow was actually giving birth as the scene was being filmed. The cow's owners ended up naming the calf Penny, after director Marshall.
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  (#10) Madonna

  • Band/Musician

  In the early 1990s, Madonna was a huge star. She had been nominated for multiple Grammy (and other) awards, and each of her first four studio albums had gone multi-platinum in the United States. She had nine singles top the Billboard Hot 100 and completed two successful world tours. She had also been in several films, most notably Desperately Seeking Susan (1985) and Dick Tracy (1990). Still, when it came to casting her in A League of Their Own, some of the executives at Columbia Pictures weren't sure whether she would be able to handle a sizable role. 

  "There's still some dispute about whether she's a 'movie star,'" a Columbia Pictures executive told the Los Angeles Times in 1991. "The feeling is that, surrounded by the right people, she's fine. The big question is whether she can take on a big role and carry it off on her own."

  Marshall thought of casting Madonna in A League of Their Own after the actor chosen to play All the Way Mae dropped out of the film. Madonna was eager to be in the film, and when producer Robert Greenhut warned her she wouldn't be paid very much, she replied that she wanted to diversify her career. Greenhut recalled that she took her role very seriously, and that although he had to occasionally reprimand her for being late to the set, she was determined to do a good job.

  Lori Petty told The Ringer that Madonna was such a huge star at the time that she wasn't even sure how to address her. "We were like, what are we even supposed to call her. We can't call her Madonna! That's like calling her the Empire State Building!" But sharing a makeup trailer with Madonna helped Petty relax around her. Madonna even confessed to the other actors that she hadn't been confident that she was going to become a huge star.

  Marshall also didn't know how to act around the superstar singer. "I couldn't get the word 'Madonna' out," she wrote in her memoir. Her solution was to deal with Madonna and O'Donnell in the same breath as "Ro and Mo."

  Davis was another person who wasn't sure what to expect, telling USA Today in 2017, "She was Madonna. We wondered if we were going to be able to talk to her. Was she going to have an entourage? Were they going to put up walls around her where she stands?" But the actor went on to state that the singer fit in well, training hard for her role and doing her own stunts like sliding head-first into the bases.
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  (#11) Rosie O'Donnell Would Sing Madonna Songs On Set To Annoy Her

  O'Donnell did not seem to be intimidated by Madonna's fame. There was a lot of downtime during filming, and O'Donnell would often fill the lulls by singing Madonna songs. According to Megan Cavanagh:

  Madonna would get so mad and swear at her... and that was part of their friendship. Rosie was not afraid of Madonna. She did what she wanted to do, and I think Madonna loved that. Rosie would sing all of "Holiday," and Madonna would get mad at her and say, "Don't ever sing one of my songs again." And the next day, she'd come out and sing "Vogue." It was so fun to watch her do that.

  Years after the film was released, O'Donnell had Marshall come on her television talk show. During that interview, O'Donnell remembered how, before she ever met Madonna, she had gone to see Truth or Dare with her boyfriend (this was during what O'Donnell called her "brief heterosexual period"). When her boyfriend speculated that O'Donnell and Madonna would be friends if they ever met, O'Donnell dismissed the chances of her ever meeting the singer.

  Two days later, she learned that Marshall wanted to cast Madonna to play the part of the best friend to O'Donnell's character. 
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  (#12) Geena Davis

  • Actor

  In the film, when the league struggles to draw fans in the first weeks of play, the man in charge of promoting the league (played by David Strathairn) asks the players to do something spectacular that will catch the eye of some visiting photographers. So when Davis's character chases after a foul pop, she does a full split as she catches the ball. And yes, the actor, not a stunt double, was the one who pulled off the move.

  "Penny asked if I could do a split," Davis told USA Today in 2017. "I said to put it later in the shooting schedule to give me time to work up to it. It’s hard to learn that quickly. But I did." 

  But while she nailed the split, the actor had a little trouble getting back up. In the film, Davis explained, "My character does a Chuck Berry split and then hops right back up. There was no popping up happening. I was stuck there and had to be helped up.”
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  (#13) Penny Marshall

  There is a definite attraction between Dottie and Jimmy in A League of Their Own, although they never act on it. In 2017, Megan Cavanagh recalled that a scene in which the characters kiss got cut from the finished film because "it was very upsetting to the real women players, apparently. Davis's character was married, and it upset the [former AAGPBL] players that she would kiss another man while her husband was at war."

  Another scene that got deleted was one where Dottie revealed that she married her husband Bob the night he got drafted.
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  (#14) Yes, The Gigantic 'Strawberry' Bruise On Alice's Thigh Was Real

  Baseball is a dangerous game. Balls are thrown or hit at high speed, player collisions aren't uncommon, and sliding on dirt can be very hard on the body. In order to look like real players, the cast trained strenuously for as many as eight hours a day, six days a week, over a period of several months. So it isn't surprising that the cast of A League of Their Own had their own version of a disabled list.

  In one scene in the film, someone in the crowd yells out for outfielder Alice Gaspers (played by Renée Coleman) to slide into third base. She does and ends up with a huge bruise on her thigh. Well, that bruise was not the result of Coleman spending hours in makeup: "That was real. That was not one pinch of makeup. She had that bruise for, like, 10 years," Tracy Reiner recalled to ESPNW in 2017.

  That was just one of the real-life injuries that cast members suffered. About two weeks before filming was set to start, Anne Ramsay was injured when a ball hit her in the face. "It was the first day that we switched from modern-day mitts to authentic, vintage mitts from the '40s," she told ESPNW. "The mitts were restored a little bit, but they were the original deals. We were in Chicago, the coach throws me the ball... and maybe the fourth time he threw it, it just slips and hits me. It breaks my nose."

  Ramsay recalled that Marshall told her that if her nose didn't look great after it was reset, the director would just write the injury into the script! Luckily, she didn't have to do this, as the nose healed fine.

  Marshall herself recalled to Newsday that Lori Petty filmed scenes while wearing a cast and that Rosie O'Donnell played with broken fingers.
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  (#15) Balls With Soft Centers Were Used In Many Of The Scenes

  In the scenes where the characters are shown batting, balls with soft centers were used instead of hard ones. Davis explained to USA Today that the precaution was taken in order to protect the crew:

  You’re actually hitting in the direction of the camera crew. For close-ups, those balls were squishy. They looked like real baseballs, but they were all spongy inside so we wouldn’t clock anyone.
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  (#16) A Chance Encounter With Neil Simon's Brother Inspired The 'Rival Sisters' Plot And A Specific Line In The Film

  Marshall became interested in making a feature film on the AAGPBL after seeing a short documentary about the league. The documentary's creators were invited to be involved in turning the story of the AAGPBL into a feature film. In fact, one of the documentary's creators had family members who had played in the league. "My mother was an outfielder, and my mother's sister was a second baseman," Kelly Candaele told ESPNW in 2017. But for the plot of the feature film script, "there was more potential for conflict and a dramatic arc by making [the characters of Dottie and Kit] a pitcher and a catcher."

  Candaele's mother and aunt were not the only influences for how scriptwriters Mandel and Ganz developed the characters of the sisters. Mandel explained that when he randomly ran into Neil Simon's mother and brother one day, the woman introduced her son by saying, "This is Neil Simon's brother." The encounter influenced an early scene in the film in which Kit asks her older sister, "You ever hear Dad introduce us to people? 'This is our daughter Dottie, and this is our other daughter, Dottie's sister.'"
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  (#17) Jon Lovitz

  Lovitz plays the sarcastic scout who recruits many of the various players. When he starts to leave after taking Dottie, Kit, and Marla to the tryouts, he tells them he will be going home to give his wife a "little pickle tickle," a line that was reportedly ad-libbed by the actor.

  Lovitz's part was originally larger. One of the scenes Marshall ended up cutting from the film involved Lovitz giving a monologue that references Babe Ruth and calls a hot dog a "meat rocket." When Lovitz protested to the director that she should keep the scene in the film, Marshall responded, "You're in the film just enough."

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