The Catcher Was a Spy

Dawidoff, Nicholas. (1994). The catcher was a spy : the mysterious life of Moe Berg. New York : Pantheon Books.


New York-born (March 2, 1902), Newark-bred, Moe was the youngest of three children. Precocious, he had his father's facility for languages. After attending NYU for a year, he went to Princeton, and graduated (in the top 10% of 211 students) in 1923. He was, and perhaps remains, Princeton's best baseball player.

Signed by the Brooklyn Robins upon graduation, Moe played in 49 games, and had 138 plate appearances. At the end of the season, having made some money, he travelled to Paris. 1924 and 1925 he played in the minors, then joined the White Sox. Never a starter, he lasted in the buig leagues until 1939 as a player, his last 5 years in Boston, then coached. He was considered an excellent catcher, and some pitcher preferred him over other catchers.
Then came WW2. Through contacts, Moe was recruited by the OSS, and sent to Europe. His assignment was to help figure out if Germany was developing an atom bomb. His facility with languages, his proclivity for secrecy, and his charm, all combined to make him an effective operative. He was ssigned to figure out of Germany's leading phycisist, Werner Heisenberg, had the necessary resources for building the bomb. He didn't.

Once the war ended Truman disbanded the OSS, and the CIA retained about 10% of its operatives; Berg was not one of those. For the third part of his life, Moe defined his own existence, even if a shabby one at times.

Fascinating is an overused word (I'm guilty as charged), but Moe Berg was a fascinating individual. It would be difficult to botch such a book, and Dawidoff did a very nice job of it.

Dawidoff writes that a good piece on MB was written by Ira Berkow in the NY Times, 24 June 1972: The Catcher Was Highly Mysterious

Gone, baby, gone

Amanda McCready is a 4-year-old who has disappeared from her Boston home. The police make little headway in solving the case, so the girl's aunt hires Patrick Kenzie and Angie Gennaro, private detectives. They freely admit that they have little experience with this type of case, but the family wants them for two reasons: they're not cops and they know the tough neighborhood in which they all live. As the case progresses, Patrick and Angie must face area drug dealers, gangs and pedophiles. When they finally solve the case, they are faced with a moral dilemma that tears them apart.

That's the blurb from the studio. And as far as it goes, it's accurate. But it misses much: profanity-laced, the film is based on a book by Dennis Lehane, and it misses being a good movie, for me, because it concentrates on violence and cursing.

Morgan Freeman makes a cameo appearance as a police captain riven by a guilty conscience, and airmails it. Perhaps this is one of those roles he takes simply because it is offered and will add to his resume; there is a rumor that he is trying to become the actor with the greatest number of entries in his filmography. If that is so, this is an entry hardly worth the effort, and one made with hardly an effort.

Ed Harris does a credible job as a detective, but his character isn't up to the challenge. The New York Times reviewer liked the movie, but I didn't like quite as much.

21

Fairly good. Smart kids are recruited by MIT Mathematics instructor to count cards and make bundles of money at Las Vegas. Protagonist, a quasi-nerd who is working on a robotic car with his two nerd buddies, is so smart the instructor recruits him to be the lead card player in the scheme.

Las Vegas, MIT and Harvard are featured, glamorized, and used as props in this quest for an easy way out. In the way of the team stands an anachronism, a human being who monitors card players and their wonts, habits and patterns to detect cheating and card counting.

Decent-enough Friday night fare.

Game 6

Nicky Rogan is a playwright and a die-hard Red Sox fan. On the night of 25 October 1986, his new play is set to open on Broadway, his leading man is having trouble remembering his lines, a savage theater critic hovers in the ether, his daughter tells him that her mother has hired a "prominent" divorce lawyer, and the Bosox can win their first World Series since 1918.

Michael Keaton does a nice job as the hapless Bosox fan; Griffin Dunne turns in a good performance as pitiable Elliot Litvak, a playwright destroyed by a scathing review by the critic played by Robert Downey (a marginal character whose presence can be accepted as credible, but whose role is not); Ari Graynor does a pretty good job as Laurel Rogan; Bebe Neuwirth's Joanna Bourne is ridiculous.

Nice film.