It’s a Wonderful Life is one of my favorite movies. I’ll watch the uninterrupted version whenever its on, although I can’t stand it when NBC airs it, turning it into a three hour snoozefest in order to get their current batch of TV series stars yakking about what the movie means to them, not to mention the additional commercials.
Jimmy Stewart, who stars in the classic, has some good baseball cred in his oeuvre: The Stratton Story and Strategic Air Command in which he plays an All-Star infielder for the St. Louis Cardinals who served bravely in WWII and is called back into action, jeopardizing the remainder of his athletic career.
I learned about another baseball connection — albeit ancillary — while watching a Youtube video, “It’s a Wonderful Life: 50 Things You Don’t Need to Know.”
It turns out that
“When George and Mary are walking past the old Granville House, George explains that if she can break a piece of glass she gets to make a wish. Now, on the set that day, they had hired a marksman so they could shoot out the pane of glass when she threw her rock. But on the first take, Donna Reed [who played the role of Mary] threw a rock and actually hit the glass. Turns out that she played baseball when she was in high school and actually had a pretty good arm.”
Oops: Should have listened to the whole thing before originally posting: Sheldon Leonard, who played the bartender, Nick, said the only reason he took the role was to have some extra money so he could go to baseball games.
is available on Amazon.com,
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