Sports and Myth
About this Episode
In this episode, David and Sarah are joined by Jane Leavy, author of groundbreaking and best-selling books on Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, and Sandy Koufax, and former colleague of David's at The Washington Post. They talk about the mythology of sports, The Babe, the relationship between reporters and athletes and the famous bar fight at the Copacabana between the Yankees and a bowling team that changed the rules about covering athletes’ private lives. Sarah asks Jane about being one of the first women reporters in the locker room and the status of women’s sports today. Jane describes an orchestrated dinner party for Billie Jean King and legendary sports writer Red Smith, and she and David discuss how baseball can return to not only a regular season, but to the pre-stat driven days of entertaining and lyrical play.
Recent Episodes from David Maraniss, Ink in Our Blood
Suzan Shown Harjo (Part 1 of 2)
Jim Kossakowski
Norbert Hill
Patty Loew
Finding the Path (Part 2 of 2)
Finding the Path (Part 1 of 2)
Making Lightning
Educating Elliott: Abraham Lincoln High and University of Michigan
In this episode, David talks about researching the formative years of his father, Elliott Maraniss, whose ordeal before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee and time in the crucible of the Red Scare are the subject of his latest book, A Good American Family. In Elliott’s old Boy Scout newsletter, high school yearbooks and articles in the University of Michigan student paper, David found the paper trail that revealed the shaping of his father’s life and political beliefs during the great depression and run-up to World War II. In the New York Public Library and the digital archive of the Michigan Daily, David came upon influential moments and people: the brilliant Jewish teachers at Abraham Lincoln High, kept from university jobs by quotas, who told Elliott’s class ‘they could not afford to be another lost generation,” as well as Elliott’s cohort at the Michigan Daily that included a young Arthur Miller and the poet John Malcom Brinnin. The newspaper was first-class, cultivating, as all good student newspaper do, a generation of writers and space for questioning authority. But the biggest revelation was the article he found confirming a family tale about how his parents met: A banquet on campus for Bob Cummins, home from the Spanish Civil War; his younger sister, Mary Cummins in attendance. And covering the event for The Michigan Daily was Elliott Maraniss.
Lombardi + The Making of the Play
In this episode, Sarah and David speak with actor Dan Lauria, who played Vince Lombardi in the Broadway production of LOMBARDI, written by Eric Simonson and based on David’s book, When Pride Still Mattered. Known for his portrayal of Jack Arnold in The Wonder Years, Dan, who is also a writer and fierce advocate for new plays, describes working with director Tommy Kail before his break-out success in Hamilton and with his co-star, Judith Light, whose nuanced portrayal of Marie Lombardi earned a Tony nomination. With his warm, funny, energetic personality, Dan regales listeners with stories about his father, the truck driver whose childhood best friend was Yankee hall of famer Phil Rizzuto, and behind-the-scenes anecdotes from the Broadway run. He also offers a vision for new play production in the changed social environment with an idea that might remind listeners of the golden age of television.