Trailer
Plot summary
Jackie Robinson plays in the Negro leagues for the Kansas City Monarchs when Dodgers scout Clyde Sukeforth approaches him. Branch Rickey, who owns the Brooklyn Dodgers, tells him what breaking baseball's color line will require, above all the restraint to answer insults without fighting back. Robinson agrees, and he proposes to Rachel Robinson, who accepts. He spends the 1946 season with the Montreal Royals, the Dodgers' farm team, in Daytona Beach, Florida, and his play earns him a place with the Dodgers, where he learns to play first base in Panama City. Some teammates sign a petition refusing to share the field with him, and manager Leo Durocher refuses to accept it.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about 42 (2013)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Boseman died as a result of complications related to colon cancer on August 28, 2020, at the age of 43. MLB and the Dodgers issued statements honoring him, publications noted he had died on the observance of Jackie Robinson Day, and AMC and Regal re-released the film that September.
- The film changes details of the real story: Pirates pitcher Fritz Ostermueller threw left-handed, not right-handed as in the film, and his first-inning pitch hit Robinson on the left wrist, not his head. He claimed it was a routine brushback pitch without racist intent, and there was no fight on the mound.
- Boseman had been directing an off-Broadway play and was considering giving up acting to pursue directing full-time when he auditioned. About twenty-five other actors were seriously considered, but director Brian Helgeland liked his bravery in choosing to read the most difficult scene, in which Robinson breaks a bat in a stadium tunnel.
- Helgeland was initially hesitant to cast Ford, seeking a character actor for the role of Rickey, but Ford won him over: he wore a fat suit and prosthetics, listened to recordings from the Baseball Hall of Fame and worked with a voice coach to capture Rickey's distinct speech.
- Boseman met Hank Aaron, whose career briefly overlapped with Robinson's, and Aaron shared his experiences with racial adversity in baseball; when Aaron visited the set, Boseman said it felt as if Robinson himself were there.
- Spike Lee initially planned to direct a biopic in 1995 with Turner Pictures, but that project fell apart due to creative differences and later financial challenges.
