Ted Savas recently published a book titled Playing With the Enemy. The book tells the story of Gene Moore, whose extremely promising baseball career was interrupted by World War II. Moore was sent on a secret mission to guard German prisoners of war, and ended up teaching them to play baseball. It makes for quite a story, and it’s a terrific book. Gene Moore’s son Gary wrote the book to honor his father and tell his story.
The rights to Gene Moore’s story were recently sold to a major Hollywood producer, Gerald R. Molen, who is going to make a major Hollywood movie from it. Presumably, Gary Moore was paid a substantial amount of money for the movie rights to his father’s story. I hope he was. There’s so little money being made in history that I root for anyone who does happen to hit it big.
I can only hope that some day, some way, one of my books will be sold to Hollywood. Maybe then, I can finally tell Susan, “See? I told you we’d make back all of that money I spent doing my book projects eventually.” 
Congratulations, Gary, and best wishes.
Coming soon to a theatre near you: The Ulric Dahlgren Story…
…starring Tom Cruise as Dahlgren.
(They’d have to let us cut his leg off, though.)
J.D.
JD,
Nah, he’s too short. Besides, he would need his head cut off, not his leg.
Eric
Ooooo… I assume we share the same opinion
But I have NO idea who should play Kilpatrick. Hey, wait – Joe Pesci with the right makeup!
J.D.
Thank you for your kind mention of Playing with the Enemy: A Baseball Prodigy, a World at War and a Field of Broken Dreams (ISBN 1932714243)!
Yes, this has been a wonderful blessing and more than we could ever have hoped for. Tris Coburn, my friend and agent told me early on that “Trying to get this published is like trying to be struck by lightning.” Thanks to Ted Savas, my friend and publisher, I was fortunate enough to be struck. And I guess the old adage that says lightning never strikes the same place twice is thankfully not an absolute because we did get the movie deal!
Do you have an agent or someone who is actively out trying to sell your work in Hollywood? I, like you, love history and know there are not enough good Civil War movies out there. But even the best work is overlooked unless someone is actively working on your behalf in the movie industry. Someone needs to be running around in the middle of the storm with a stel pole in the air!
Again thank you for your kind words.
Gary
Gary,
You’re very welcome. I have to admit to being just a touch jealous.
No, I don’t know anyone in Hollywood who might be trying to sell my stuff, although I do have an idea for one….
Again, best of luck with your book.
Eric