You need only to feel the widespread and emotional reaction to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s tragic death Sunday to know how beloved a performer he was. How his characters connected with his audience.
In the baseball community, his greatness can be measured by this: He impressed the guy he played, even though that guy hated the character.
“It’s a shame,” Art Howe told The Post on Monday of Hoffman’s passing . “He was a tremendous talent. … I saw his comments about his portrayal of me. He was following his script. He knew it wasn’t me, but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.”
Howe and Hoffman are linked through “Moneyball,” the 2011 hit based on author Michael Lewis’ bestselling book that goes inside the 2002 Oakland A’s. Lewis didn’t hold back on the obvious tension between Howe and his A’s boss Billy Beane, the story’s protagonist, so it’s no surprise that the film, too, plays up that discord, with Hoffman’s Howe and Brad Pitt’s Beane constantly bickering about how to best run the club. The film neglects to mention that, after the 2002 season, Howe left Beane and the A’s to become the Mets’ manager.
Hoffman nearly missed adding this film to his canon — and Howe nearly avoided such future agita. Pitt and acclaimed director Steven Soderbergh were far down the road in making a more fact-based version of what went down in ’02, so much so that Howe and his ’02 A’s pitching coach Rick Peterson (who later joined Howe in Flushing and stuck around to work alongside Willie Randolph) had signed on to play themselves; Peterson had agreed to be the technical director.
Sony scrapped that plan just days before filming was set to begin in 2009, and the movie revived only after Pitt agreed to move forward with director Bennett Miller, whose biggest claim to fame was directing Hoffman’s Oscar-winning performance in “Capote.” That’s how Hoffman reportedly became interested and asked to play Howe.
Putting on my amateur film critic’s hat, Howe doesn’t go down as Hoffman’s very best role; in addition to his “Capote” win, he drew Best Supporting Actor nominations for his work in “Charlie Wilson’s War” (2008), “Doubt” (2009) and “The Master” (2013). Then again, I might be biased. I knew that the real Howe didn’t bring the taciturn heft to actual life that Hoffman did to his performance.
Hoffman lights up the screen far more than the easygoing Howe ever “lit up” Shea Stadium, to borrow Fred Wilpon’s infamous phrase upon signing Howe to a four-year deal as manager. In the film, Howe and Beane argue about the usage of statistical analysis in terms of lineup construction, and Howe also complains about not having a contract for the next season; Howe actually was signed through 2003, although Beane let him go to the Mets for no compensation.
“Ninety percent of my scenes were false,” Howe said. “I guess someone had to be the villain. I was the villain. … Now, any time I see ‘Based on a true story,’ I know it’s very loosely based on a true story.”
“I didn’t see Art as a villain in that movie,” Peterson said. “He was really sort of a nonentity in the movie. Billy treated him like a pet, so to speak, and that really wasn’t the case.
“Art oftentimes was much stronger to Billy than the way that character portrayed him. He wouldn’t battle Billy. He had such a strong distaste for Billy that when Billy did some of the stuff he did, Art didn’t want to deal with it. He just walked out.”
Howe, whom the Mets dismissed after the 2004 season, never met Hoffman, whereas Beane spent extensive time with Pitt and former A’s assistant GM (and current Mets vice president of player development and amateur scouting) Paul DePodesta met Jonah Hill, who portrayed the renamed “Peter Brand.” Beane said Monday that he met Hoffman only briefly at a premiere, and DePodesta said he never met Hoffman.
It was only because people kept asking him about it, Howe said, that he eventually went to see the film. As much as he disliked it, he never blamed the actor assigned to play him.
“He didn’t write the script,” Howe said of Hoffman.
“The reality is, the actors did their jobs,” DePodesta said Monday. “They sort of created characters, created a film, I think they all did very good jobs. I don’t think any of them were really trying to mimic any of us, in that sense. It wasn’t a documentary.”
It became Hoffman’s one contribution to baseball cinema. If he struck out on accuracy with his Howe portrayal, he still scored points for adding to the “Moneyball” legend.