Go Man Go (film)

Last updated
Go, Man, Go!
Go Man Go 1954 poster.jpg
1954 Theatrical Poster
Directed by James Wong Howe
Written byAlfred Palca
Produced byAlfred Palca
Starring Dane Clark
Sidney Poitier
Ruby Dee
The Harlem Globetrotters
Patricia Breslin
CinematographyWilliam O. Steiner
Edited by Faith Elliott
Music by Alex North
Production
company
Sirod Productions
Distributed by United Artists
Release date
  • January 27, 1954 (1954-01-27)
Running time
82 minutes
CountryUnited States
Language English
Budget$300,000 [1]
Box office$800,000 (US/Canada rental estimate) [1]

Go, Man, Go! is a 1954 American sports film directed by James Wong Howe, starring Dane Clark, Sidney Poitier, Ruby Dee, Patricia Breslin, The Harlem Globetrotters and Slim Gaillard. Clark plays Abe Saperstein, the organizer of the Globetrotters. Poitier's character is Inman Jackson, the team's showboating center. Breslin plays Sylvia Saperstein, the love interest, and Abe's daughter. Gaillard plays himself.

Contents

Plot

The film tracks the Globetrotters from humble beginnings through a triumph over a major-league basketball team, as they struggle to overcome racial discrimination. Actual Harlem Globetrotter players portray the team in basketball action throughout the picture. [2] The friendship between Saperstein and Jackson, and their wives, is an important storyline. [3]

Cast

Production

The film was cinematographer Howe's directorial debut. It was filmed at the Fox Movietone Studios and at Madison Square Garden in New York in 20 days. [4]

Hollywood blacklist

Screenwriter and producer Alfred Palca was accused by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in 1953 of being a Communist. He refused to cooperate with their investigations. No distributor was willing to release the film with his name credited, so he gave the producing credit to his brother-in-law, Anton Leader, and the screenwriting credit to his cousin, Arnold Becker, a pediatrician. He never worked in the film industry again. According to Palca, the F.B.I. saw his casting of Poitier as further evidence of his Communism. [5]

In 1997, a ceremony at the Academy Theatre honored blacklisted Hollywood writers and directors and restored Palca's writing credit for the film. [6]

Reception

Bosley Crowther, reviewing the film for The New York Times , observed, "This is the second little picture in which the Globetrotters have been starred. The encore is not excessive. They still give an entertaining show." [2]

See also

Related Research Articles

<i>The Defiant Ones</i> 1958 film by Stanley Kramer

The Defiant Ones is a 1958 American drama film which tells the story of two escaped prisoners, one white and one black, who are shackled together and who must co-operate in order to survive. It stars Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier.

The American Basketball League played one full season, 1961–1962, and approximately one-third of the next season until the league folded on December 31, 1962. The ABL was the first basketball league to have a three-point field goal for shots attempted from longer distance. Other rules that set the league apart from the National Basketball Association (NBA) were a 30-second shooting clock, as opposed to 24, and a wider free throw lane of 18 feet instead of the NBA's then-standard 12.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harlem Globetrotters</span> American exhibition basketball team

The Harlem Globetrotters are an American exhibition basketball team. They combine athleticism, theater, entertainment, and comedy in their style of play. Over the years, they have played more than 26,000 exhibition games in 124 countries and territories, mostly against deliberately ineffective opponents, such as the Washington Generals and the New York Nationals (1995–2015). The team's signature song is Brother Bones' whistled version of "Sweet Georgia Brown", and their mascot is an anthropomorphized globe named "Globie". The team is owned by Herschend Family Entertainment.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abe Saperstein</span> Harlem Globetrotters founder and first coach (1902-1966)

Abraham Michael Saperstein was the founder, owner and earliest coach of the Harlem Globetrotters. Saperstein was a leading figure in black basketball and baseball from the 1920s through the 1950s, primarily before those sports were racially integrated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Washington Generals</span> Exhibition basketball team known for losing

The Washington Generals are an American basketball team who play exhibition games against the Harlem Globetrotters. The team has also played under several different aliases in their history as the Globetrotters' perennial opponents.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Goose Tatum</span> 20th-century American professional basketball and baseball player

Reece "Goose" Tatum was an American Negro league baseball and basketball player. In 1942, he was signed to the Harlem Globetrotters and had an 11-year career with the team. He later formed his own team known as the Harlem Magicians with former Globetrotters player Marques Haynes. He is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame. Tatum's number 50 is retired by the Globetrotters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dane Clark</span> American film actor (1912–1998)

Dane Clark was an American character actor who was known for playing, as he labeled himself, "Joe Average."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marques Haynes</span> American basketball player (1926–2015)

Marques Haynes was an American professional basketball player and member of the Harlem Globetrotters, notable for his ability to dribble the ball and keep it away from defenders. According to the 1988 film Harlem Globetrotters: Six Decades of Magic, Haynes could dribble the ball as many as 348 times a minute.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chicago Majors</span> Basketball team

The Chicago Majors were a basketball team based in Chicago, Illinois, that was a member of the American Basketball League from 1961 to 1963.

<i>The Jesse Owens Story</i> 1984 television film

The Jesse Owens Story is a 1984 American two-part, four-hour made-for-television biographical film about the black athlete Jesse Owens. Dorian Harewood plays the Olympic gold-winning athlete. The drama won a 1985 Primetime Emmy Award and was nominated for two more. It originally premiered in syndication on July 9 and 10, 1984 as part of Operation Prime Time's syndicated programming.

Ah Chew Goo was an American basketball player and coach of the University of Hawaii men's basketball team, who was known primarily for his basketball dribbling and passing abilities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patricia Breslin</span> American actress and philanthropist (1925–2011)

Patricia Rose Breslin was an American actress and philanthropist. She had a prominent career in television, which included recurring roles as Amanda Miller on The People's Choice (1955–58), and as Laura Harrington Brooks on Peyton Place (1964–65). She also appeared in Go, Man, Go! (1954), and the William Castle horror films Homicidal (1961) and I Saw What You Did (1965).

<i>Edge of the City</i> 1957 film by Martin Ritt

Edge of the City is a 1957 American film-noir drama film directed by Martin Ritt in his directorial debut, and starring John Cassavetes and Sidney Poitier. Robert Alan Aurthur's screenplay was expanded from his original script, staged as the final episode of Philco Television Playhouse, A Man Is Ten Feet Tall (1955), also featuring Poitier.

"Jumpin" Jackie Jackson was an American professional basketball player. Jackson was one of the first streetball legends in the Rucker Playground Basketball Tournaments in New York City in the early 1960s. He went on to a 20-year career with the Harlem Globetrotters, earning his nickname by allegedly snatching a quarter from the top of a basketball backboard on a bet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harlem Magicians</span>

Harlem Magicians was a basketball enterprise founded in 1953 by Lon Varnell through his Varnell Enterprises, that was similar in fashion and activities to the famous exhibition basketball team the Harlem Globetrotters. The full name of the barnstorming basketball team was the Fabulous Harlem Magicians with the main star attraction of the team being Marques Haynes. Haynes had been a member of the Globetrotters, but had left the team due to a contract dispute to join the Magicians. Other famous players in the team were Goose Tatum, comic Sam "Boom" Wheeler, Josh Grider, Ron Cavenall, and Bob "Ergie" Erickson. Dempsey Hovland, founder of 20th Century Booking Agency and himself owner of several barnstorming teams, was recruited to book the Harlem Magicians' games.

<i>Her Kind of Man</i> 1946 film by Frederick de Cordova

Her Kind of Man is a 1946 American crime film noir directed by Frederick De Cordova, and starring Dane Clark, Janis Paige and Zachary Scott. The film is not to be confused with His Kind of Woman (1951) starring Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bob Karstens</span> American basketball player

Robert H. Karstens was a professional basketball player in the United States. Karstens was born in Davenport, Iowa and attended school at Iowa Central Turner Gym and St. Ambrose College. A white man, Karstens was the third non-black player on the Harlem Globetrotters' roster. First was owner Abe Saperstein as a substitute in the team's first year. Second was Rob Nichol a Canadian in 1941. He invented a few routines including the magic circle and the yo yo basketball. He played on the All Black Team, 8 years before the NBA was integrated. He stayed on as a team manager from 1954 to 1994. He died on December 31, 2004.

The 1948 Globetrotters–Lakers game was a dramatic match-up between the Harlem Globetrotters and the Minneapolis Lakers. Played in Chicago Stadium, the game took place two years before professional basketball was desegregated. The Globetrotters' 61–59 victory – by two points at the buzzer – challenged prevailing racial stereotypes about the abilities of black athletes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Winfield Welch</span> American baseball player

Winfield Scott Welch, nicknamed "Gus" and "Moe", was an American Negro league outfielder and manager. Welch spent most of his playing career with minor Negro teams. He is best known as a successful manager, lauded by some as "the Connie Mack of Negro baseball"

<i>Sweetwater</i> (2023 film) Film by Martin Guigui

Sweetwater is a 2023 American biographical sports film about Nat Clifton, the first African-American to sign a contract with the National Basketball Association (NBA). Written and directed by Martin Guigui, it stars Everett Osborne as Clifton, with Cary Elwes, Jeremy Piven, Richard Dreyfuss, and Kevin Pollak in supporting roles.

References

  1. 1 2 "Rialto drops sexsational policy". Variety. 24 February 1954. p. 20.
  2. 1 2 Crowther, Bosley (March 10, 1954). "THE SCREEN IN REVIEW; Harlem Globetrotters Perform in a Sports Romance, 'Go, Man, Go!' at the Globe". New York Times . Retrieved 2008-05-04.
  3. Brennan, Sandra. "Go, Man, Go!". Allmovie . Retrieved 2008-05-04.
  4. "2 Factors Held Back Howe in N.Y. Filming of 'Go, Man, Go', 20-Day Biopic". Variety . August 19, 1953. p. 7. Retrieved March 17, 2024 via Internet Archive.
  5. Weber, Bruce (August 20, 1997). "Four Decades After He Was Blacklisted, A Writer-Producer Finally Gets Credit". New York Times . Retrieved 2008-05-04.
  6. Smith, Dinitia (22 June 1998). "Alfred Palca, 78, Screenwriter Blacklisted After Basketball Film". The New York Times .