The award-winning documentary film, “The Life and Times and Hank Greenberg,” is being remastered and theatrically re-released in honor of its 25th anniversary this fall and will come to the D.C. area with screenings at the Edlavitch DCJCC on Sept. 24-26 and the Avalon Theatre on Sept. 29.
The film covers the story of Greenberg, the first Jewish superstar in Major League Baseball, who primarily played first base for the Detroit Tigers in the 1930s and 40s, dealing with the challenges of prejudice and antisemitism as he competed with all-time greats like Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.
The 1999 film will be remastered in 4K and celebrates the 90th anniversary of Greenberg’s “Yom Kippur Stand” when the 2-time MLB MVP chose to attend synagogue at Congregation Shaarey Zedek in Detroit, Michigan, sitting out an important game on Sept.18, 1934, during a pennant race.
The Hall of Famer was an inspiration to many Jews, including the father of Aviva Kempner, the film’s director, as she grew up in Detroit and is now based out of D.C.
Kempner has been making films about “the untold stories of Jewish heroes” for 44 years. She created The Ciesla Foundation, the group behind the re-release.
“The big thing in Detroit, especially in the 50s and 60s, were the Detroit Tigers. My father was that typical immigrant, Jewish man who just loved baseball, and especially after my parents were divorced. It’s something he did with my brother and I,” Kempner said.
Kempner recalls on every Yom Kippur growing up she would hear the story about Greenberg skipping the game on Yom Kippur and attending synagogue.
She decided to make the film about Greenberg’s life after she learned about his death in 1986 and spent the next 13 years gathering old interviews and footage to put together along with raising money for the project to continue.
“I think he [Greenberg] is the most important American Jewish sports figure for us. I have all the admiration in the world for Sandy Koufax, but Hank played in Detroit when Father Coughlin was spewing his antisemitic tirades, and where Henry Ford was giving out ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ for free at his dealerships. There was no other white player that ever experienced that,” Kempner said.
Kempner added that it’s important for the film to be re-released and shown to audiences around the country given the recent rise in antisemitism, especially on college campuses.
Kempner said she visited her alma mater, the University of Michigan, while on a trip to show excerpts of the film at Shaarey Zedek for the 25th anniversary and heard that a Jewish student on campus had been assaulted.
“I realized, with all this antisemitism happening on campus that I want to get the funding, most importantly, to take this film and show it to all the Hillels in America,” Kempner said.
Kempner said she believes that seeing the Greenberg film could be a source of hope and inspiration to Jewish college students during difficult times, which furthers her drive to get the movie in front of audiences everywhere.
“As much as I’m glad that I’m bringing these films out, there’s a little bit of sadness in me that we need them, if you know what I mean, for political reasons rather than just historical reasons,” Kempner said.
Kempner said that she chose the film to premiere at the EDCJCC because she was an original member of the board and created the Washington Jewish Film Festival in 1990.
Kempner added that the end credits contain a call for the statehood of Washington, D.C., a cause she is an outspoken activist for, and the new screening will be dedicated to the release of the hostages in Israel.
Additionally, there will be a wide variety of knowledgeable speakers available for a Q&A session after each of the screenings.
The Sept. 24 screening Q&A at the EDCJCC will feature Kempner; Bruce Adams, founder of the Bethesda Community Baseball Club; Ed Baranoski, vice president of the DC Bob Davids chapter of SABR; Matthew Frumin, a Washington D.C. councilman who grew up a Tigers fan in Detroit; and George Solomon, the former sports editor of The Washington Post.
The Sept. 25 screening Q&A at the EDCJCC will feature Kempner; Grace Guggenheim, filmmaker and line producer of Archival Restoration; Ben Dally, director of film development and marketing at The Ciesla Foundation; Lauren Meschner, colorist and postproduction manager at Henninger Media Services; and Zach Sinick, music supervisor for the remastered version.
The Sept. 26 screening Q&A at the EDCJCC will feature Kempner; Dan Raviv, author and former CBS correspondent; Frank Foer, staff writer at The Atlantic and author of the book, “Jewish Jocks; former Ambassador Daniel Kurtzer, former U.S. ambassador to Egypt and Israel, professor at Princeton University, and first commissioner of the Israel Baseball League; Rep. Deborah Wasserman Schultz, a co-chair of the Congressional Caucus on Black-Jewish Relations; and Assaf Lowengart, infielder for the minor league team, the New York Boulders, and a member of the Israeli baseball team.
The Sept. 29 screening Q&A at the Avalon Theatre will feature Kempner; Jonathan Kempner, Tigers fan and chairman of the Ciesla Foundation board; Marian Sears Hunter, editor; E. Ethlebert Miller, a poet; and Lowengart.
More information about the screenings can be found at edcjcc.org.
