***SPOILERS*** Very probably the best of the slew of a loved one dying of an unnamed and incurable disease movie of the early 1970's Bang the Drum Slowly predated the grand daddy of all those five handkerchief tearjerker-"Love Story"-by some 15 years. The 1973 movie was originally shown on TV's United States Steel Hour in September 1956 staring Paul Newman and Albert Saimi in the leading roles of Henry Wiggen & Bruce Pearson.
It's when New York Mammoth star pitching ace Henry Wiggins, Michael Moriarty, held out sighing his yearly club contract during spring training that it was suspected that he wanted something far more then the money, 70,000 smackers, that his team offered him. Soon it became obvious that his relationship with his roommate and catcher Bruce Pearson, Robert De Niro, was behind Wiggens holding out! That, Wigens relationship with Pearson, was far more important then what he can get in cash from the Mammoth's owners. Wiggens insisted that if Pearson, who was having a rotten spring training, is ever traded to another team he's to be traded along with him!
You could just imagine all the rumors and snickering Wiggens' demands conjured up among his fellow Mammoth teammates and the teams manager, the I've seen it all but in this case I'll have to pass, Dutch Schnell, Vincent Gardenia. What exactly is going on between these two guys anyway! Was it that mysterious hunting and fishing trip last winter to the wilds of Minnesota that somehow caused them, in being alone in the states dark and forbidden forests, to somehow change their outlook on life. Did that romp in the woods cause then to get off the straight and narrow road and become unnaturally friendly with each other?
It's later in the baseball season with poor Bruce Pearson, playing the best baseball of his entire career, being on the verge of collapsing from sheer exhaustion that Wiggens finally reveals to Mommoth teammate Goose Williams, Tom Signorelli, the shocking truth behind his odd friendship with his ailing battery mate. It was that winter when a concerned Wiggens had his friend Pearson secretly checked into the Mayo Clinic, in Minnesota, that he found out that he was in fact dying from an incurable disease: Hodgkins lymphoma! All Pearson now wanted was to not only finish out the season as the club's first string catcher but be a part in helping the team win the league's pennant as well as the World Series.
With the cat now out of the bag in what Pearson is going through, in him having a few months left to live, the Mommoth players stop their bickering with each other as well as picking on and needling the good natured and friendly Bruce Pearson and instead get down to business. It's then that he Mommoth players join together as a team and, with Pearson providing the glue, stick together and go all the way to the top of the baseball world as its World Champions.
***SPOILERS*** In the end Pearson didn't live out the year dying just before Christmas but at least being part of the Championship New York Mammoth team. This had Pearson go out of this world as a winner not only in baseball but even over the dreaded and fatal disease that eventually took his life Hodgkins lymphoma. It was fitting that only Pearson's good friend and teammate Henry Wiggins was the only members of the Mammoth team to attend his funeral. Since it was Wiggens who was by Pearson's side right from the start until the end as he was dying from his incurable disease. And it was Wiggens more then anyone one else, with the exception of Persons family members, who should have been with him when he was laid to his final resting place.
P.S it was nice to see that some of "Bang the Drum Slowly" scenes were filmed at the old old, before it was closed down and completely refurbished in 1974, New York's Yaknee Stadium known as "The House that Ruth Built". Unlike in the new and now even newer, opened last years, Yankee Stadium it was in that historic and majestic ballpark that the great Babe Ruth himself played most of his major league games and gave the fans who watched him play their greatest baseball memories.
It's when New York Mammoth star pitching ace Henry Wiggins, Michael Moriarty, held out sighing his yearly club contract during spring training that it was suspected that he wanted something far more then the money, 70,000 smackers, that his team offered him. Soon it became obvious that his relationship with his roommate and catcher Bruce Pearson, Robert De Niro, was behind Wiggens holding out! That, Wigens relationship with Pearson, was far more important then what he can get in cash from the Mammoth's owners. Wiggens insisted that if Pearson, who was having a rotten spring training, is ever traded to another team he's to be traded along with him!
You could just imagine all the rumors and snickering Wiggens' demands conjured up among his fellow Mammoth teammates and the teams manager, the I've seen it all but in this case I'll have to pass, Dutch Schnell, Vincent Gardenia. What exactly is going on between these two guys anyway! Was it that mysterious hunting and fishing trip last winter to the wilds of Minnesota that somehow caused them, in being alone in the states dark and forbidden forests, to somehow change their outlook on life. Did that romp in the woods cause then to get off the straight and narrow road and become unnaturally friendly with each other?
It's later in the baseball season with poor Bruce Pearson, playing the best baseball of his entire career, being on the verge of collapsing from sheer exhaustion that Wiggens finally reveals to Mommoth teammate Goose Williams, Tom Signorelli, the shocking truth behind his odd friendship with his ailing battery mate. It was that winter when a concerned Wiggens had his friend Pearson secretly checked into the Mayo Clinic, in Minnesota, that he found out that he was in fact dying from an incurable disease: Hodgkins lymphoma! All Pearson now wanted was to not only finish out the season as the club's first string catcher but be a part in helping the team win the league's pennant as well as the World Series.
With the cat now out of the bag in what Pearson is going through, in him having a few months left to live, the Mommoth players stop their bickering with each other as well as picking on and needling the good natured and friendly Bruce Pearson and instead get down to business. It's then that he Mommoth players join together as a team and, with Pearson providing the glue, stick together and go all the way to the top of the baseball world as its World Champions.
***SPOILERS*** In the end Pearson didn't live out the year dying just before Christmas but at least being part of the Championship New York Mammoth team. This had Pearson go out of this world as a winner not only in baseball but even over the dreaded and fatal disease that eventually took his life Hodgkins lymphoma. It was fitting that only Pearson's good friend and teammate Henry Wiggins was the only members of the Mammoth team to attend his funeral. Since it was Wiggens who was by Pearson's side right from the start until the end as he was dying from his incurable disease. And it was Wiggens more then anyone one else, with the exception of Persons family members, who should have been with him when he was laid to his final resting place.
P.S it was nice to see that some of "Bang the Drum Slowly" scenes were filmed at the old old, before it was closed down and completely refurbished in 1974, New York's Yaknee Stadium known as "The House that Ruth Built". Unlike in the new and now even newer, opened last years, Yankee Stadium it was in that historic and majestic ballpark that the great Babe Ruth himself played most of his major league games and gave the fans who watched him play their greatest baseball memories.