05 Jan New York Yankees said no to Spotlight

Well, here’s a story that plays into my prejudices on many levels.

“Spotlight,” a highlight of the Christmas movie season and likely Oscar nominee, details the painstaking investigation by the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team that exposed the coverup and condonation of sexual abuse by more than 70 pedophile priests in the Boston Archdiocese of the Catholic Church. The Globe’s work led to the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law.

It’s a gripping account of the nuts, bolts, and shoe leather that go into investigative journalism, free from the sentimental claptrap that infects so many movies about newspapers. A journalist friend wrote that she, “especially liked the portrayal of the journos as regular working slobs and not as mini-celebs.”

When I was fresh out of college—in fact, before I finished college—I was a reporter and columnist at the Globe. It was fun for me to see a movie shot in a building and a city where I used to work.

Now comes a prejudice-confirming footnote. A scene early in Spotlight shows the Globe reporters watching a ballgame in Fenway Park, home of the Red Sox. Reports the Globe:

Producers had hoped to shoot the scene during a Red Sox-Yankees game at Fenway because it worked with the production schedule, but that didn’t happen. According to director Tom McCarthy, the Yankees requested to see the script, and after reading it, decided they didn’t want to participate.

“They didn’t think it was appropriate material for the Yankees organization to be affiliated with,” McCarthy told us. “They didn’t want to be part of this and they recommended that the Red Sox not be a part of it, either. The Yankees didn’t think it was an appropriate subject for Major League Baseball to be dealing with.”

Fortunately, the Red Sox and the Globe share an owner, the idealistic and improbably named businessman John Henry, who was fine with the script. The filmmakers shot the scene at a Red Sox-Rays game in September 2014. Director McCarthy, who grew up a Yankees fan, thinks there’s a wider lesson in the team’s reticence:

“When big money and powerful interests get involved, it’s sometimes easier and better to ignore issues,” he said.

Alas, Cineplex pulled Spotlight from its theatres in Atlantic Canada the day before Christmas, and it’s not yet available for download or rental (except via Bittorrent). By all means, find a way to see it.

[Boston Globe photo by Jim Davis.]