Production began on the docudrama “The Lost Superstar: The Oscar Charleston Story” at League Stadium this week. The two-hour film is based on Jeremy Beer’s biography of the baseball player Buck O’Neil described as “Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, and Tris Speaker rolled into one.” A centerfielder who played in the Negro League, Charleston has been listed as one of the top players in the history of the game. In the photo, crews were completing hero shots in the outfield of League Stadium Friday morning.
Director Jerald Harkness (pictured), President and CEO of Studio Auteur, said he visited League Stadium during the filming of “The Soul of the Game,” another film depicting the Negro League with more well-known players like Satchel Paige and Jackie Robinson. Harkness said that experience led him to choose the stadium for his new feature. Harkness thanked the City of Huntingburg for its help and hospitality during filming.
The crews will be at the stadium for one more day as they film reenactments for the film. Saturday, they plan on reenacting a brawl that occurred after a base umpire refused to call a white player out during a force out at second base. Charleston, who was known for his hotheaded competitiveness on the field, ran in from centerfield and punched the umpire, which led to the brawl. Jeremy Beers, author of “Oscar Charleston =The Life and Legend of Baseball’s Greatest Forgotten Player,” said that though Charleston had this reputation on the field, he was a gentleman and highly respected off the field. Beer also found that in his research of baseball in the early 1900s, there were a lot of brawls on the field.
Front, Landen Rays and Gabe Wright, both former Terra Haute Rex players who have played against the Bombers at League Stadium, were chosen to play unnamed baseball players in the production. Behind them, Indianapolis actor Mcharris Hodonou portrays Satchel Paige in the film. Hodonou, who said he has never played baseball, has been studying Paige’s pitching style to emulate it on the mound for his scenes.
The crew films Blake Beemer, who portrays Charleston, as he swings the bat at home plate.
Beemer is the head coach of Butler University’s baseball team. He was recruited to play for Charleston due to his extensive baseball experience. He has never acted but felt at ease on the field, reprising the role of a baseball player.
Beemer called the project “an honor” and pointed out how much Negro Leagues history — including Charleston’s own legacy as one of the best teams of all time — has gone untold. That history isn’t abstract for him. Last spring, Butler played Wichita State over spring break, and the team drove back through Kansas City specifically to stop at the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, where museum president Bob Kendrick personally walked them through the exhibits and the story of Charleston and his contemporaries. The team has a photo standing at the Oscar Charleston statue there. He tied that history to something bigger, too, citing Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in 1947 as one of the most significant moments in American sports.The opposing team’s fielders expressed disdain as Beemer reenacted rounding the bases after hitting a home run during filming Friday morning.
