Bang the Drum Slowly

Bang the Drum Slowly is a 1973 American sports drama film directed by John D. Hancock, about a baseball player of limited intellect who has a terminal illness, and his brainier, more skilled teammate. It is a film adaptation of the 1956 baseball novel of the same name by American author Mark Harris. It was previously dramatized in 1956 on the U.S. Steel Hour with Paul Newman, Albert Salmi and George Peppard. This version stars Michael Moriarty and a then little known Robert De Niro as baseball teammates. De Niro's performance in this film and in Mean Streets, released two months later, brought him widespread acclaim. Plot Henry Wiggen is a star pitcher for the New York Mammoths, a fictional Major League Baseball team. He is a valuable player to his manager Dutch but is in a dispute with the team's ownership, holding out for a new contract and more money. Henry has a sideline as an insurance salesman working for the Arcturus Corporation, with ballplayers as his clients. Henry's friend Bruce Pearson, the team's catcher, is a player of limited skill and intellect. Teammates call Henry by the nickname "Author" because the brainy pitcher once wrote a book, although Bruce misunderstands and, with his thick Southern drawl, often calls him "Arthur" instead. Henry and Bruce leave the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, where Bruce has been told he is terminally ill with Hodgkin's disease. They drive to Bruce's hometown in Georgia, because Bruce always wanted his only friend to see it. On their first night there, Bruce burns his old baseball memorabilia to acknowledge the inevitable end of his life.