50 Fun Facts About The Natural

How does Roy Hobbs's last at-bat end in the 1952 novel The Natural, an ending the 1984 film changed?

He strikes out against a brilliant young pitcher, having earlier agreed to lose on purpose. The 1984 film swapped that bleak finish for a game-winning home run.

In The Natural, what name does Roy Hobbs give the bat he carves from a tree split by lightning?

Wonderboy is branded with a lightning bolt in the film, and it finally splits in two on a foul ball during the deciding game.

The Whammer, the swaggering slugger whom young Roy Hobbs humbles in The Natural, is modeled on which real star?

Babe Ruth is the model for the Whammer, a three-time Most Valuable Player whom the unknown 19-year-old beats on three pitches to win a bet.

Which star, returning to acting after three years away, played the aging rookie Roy Hobbs in The Natural?

Robert Redford had not acted on screen since the 1980 prison drama Brubaker, and he came back as a 35-year-old rookie with a hidden past.

In the 1984 film The Natural, Roy Hobbs's final home run smashes into what, raining sparks over the field?

The stadium lights explode in a chain of sparks as Hobbs, bleeding through his uniform from an old wound, rounds the bases.

Which animated series spoofed The Natural in a softball episode whose hero's bat comes from a lightning-struck tree?

The Simpsons did it in Homer at the Bat, where Mr. Burns bets a million dollars on the plant's team and hires nine real big-league players as ringers.

Which American author made his debut as a novelist with The Natural, a baseball fable published in 1952?

Bernard Malamud burned the manuscript of an earlier novel, so this myth-soaked baseball story became his first published book.

For which fictional last-place baseball team does Roy Hobbs become a slugging sensation in The Natural?

In the film, the New York Knights are bottom of the league when their manager nearly ships the unknown 35-year-old to the minors, until he watches him take batting practice.

Which singer-songwriter earned an Oscar nomination for composing the soaring orchestral score of The Natural?

Randy Newman wrote a theme that became a stock sound of baseball itself, replayed in film trailers and at ballparks when the home team is introduced.

In the 1984 film The Natural, what happens to the baseball on Roy Hobbs's first major-league hit?

Its cover is torn off as he pinch-hits a triple against the Phillies, and the unknown 35-year-old becomes an overnight sensation.

Which actress earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nomination as Iris Gaines, Roy Hobbs's lost love in The Natural?

Glenn Close earned her third Oscar nomination in three years for the small part of the woman whose return to Hobbs's life ends his slump.

Which actress earned a Golden Globe nomination as Memo Paris, the temptress who distracts Roy Hobbs in The Natural?

Kim Basinger plays the woman the manager calls bad luck: once Hobbs takes up with her, he and the whole team fall into a slump.

In The Natural, 19-year-old Roy Hobbs is heading for a tryout with which real team when he is shot?

The Chicago Cubs tryout never happens: a woman from the journey lures him to her hotel room and shoots him, and he vanishes from baseball until his mid-thirties.

At the start of The Natural, how is young Roy Hobbs traveling when he meets a famous slugger and a mysterious woman?

On a train bound for his big-league tryout, where a prying reporter, the league's top hitter and his future assailant all share the ride.

How does Bump Bailey, the star whose place Roy Hobbs takes in The Natural, come to die?

Hitting the outfield wall while chasing a fly ball kills him, days after the manager benched him for not hustling and sent Hobbs up to bat in his place.

The Natural recasts which legendary British ruler's story as baseball, with a questing hero and a manager named Fisher?

King Arthur's Grail legend shapes the whole book: Hobbs plays the Grail-seeker Perceval, and his ailing manager represents the wounded Fisher King.

The 1984 film The Natural ends on a farm with Roy Hobbs doing what as Iris looks on?

Playing catch with his son Ted, in the same field where he once played with his own father. The novel allows no such homecoming: its hero ends in disgrace.

In The Natural, what must Roy Hobbs's team do for manager Pop Fisher to keep his stake from the Judge?

Win the pennant and Pop holds on to the club; fall short and the Judge takes his share, which is why the Judge pays players to lose.

Which Godfather actor played Max Mercy, the newspaperman digging into Roy Hobbs's hidden past in The Natural?

Robert Duvall plays the prying columnist who saw the teenage Hobbs beat a famous slugger and, years later, recognizes him by his fastball.

Most baseball scenes in The Natural were shot at an aging football ground in which upstate New York city?

Buffalo's War Memorial ground was built for football, so the crew never filmed it from high up, hiding fences that sat far too near home plate on one side.

Which director made The Natural his second feature and voiced its radio announcer himself?

Barry Levinson, fresh from his debut Diner, recorded the announcer's lines himself because post-production left no time to find a professional voice.

In The Natural, Roy Hobbs's homer shatters the scoreboard clock at which real ballpark, faked at a high school?

Wrigley Field was faked at a school ground in the same city as the main set, with details added in post-production; the blast there ends a long slump.

The bullet a doctor finds in Roy Hobbs's stomach years later in The Natural is made of which metal?

Silver is the metal in both book and film: the woman who shoots him uses a silver bullet, and the film's doctor warns it may kill him if he keeps playing.

After Roy Hobbs's own bat splits in the finale of the 1984 film The Natural, which bat does the batboy hand him?

Savoy Special is the bat that batboy Bobby Savoy made for himself under Hobbs's guidance, and it delivers the winning home run.

The star of The Natural modeled Roy Hobbs's left-handed swing on which Boston Red Sox legend?

Ted Williams was the model, studied so carefully that a veteran New Yorker baseball writer said the actor looked good enough to sign.

Which mustachioed actor, still in his forties, played elderly manager Pop Fisher in The Natural?

Wilford Brimley was only two years older than the film's star, yet played a man near retirement; a year later he was a pensioner in Cocoon.

In The Natural, where does young Roy Hobbs meet the Whammer in a three-pitch showdown during an unscheduled stop?

A carnival at the edge of a town is the setting: the slugger shows off in a batting cage, and the unknown teenager fans him to settle a bet.

The bribe plot of the 1952 novel The Natural borrows from which real case of baseball corruption?

The Black Sox scandal of 1919, in which eight players were charged with taking bribes to lose the World Series, gave the novel its fixed final game.

The Natural was the first film produced by which newly formed Hollywood studio?

TriStar Pictures was so new that its logo was printed on the soundtrack album to mark the film as its first production.

Which actress played Harriet Bird, the mysterious stranger who shoots Roy Hobbs in the 1984 film The Natural?

Barbara Hershey's role echoes a real case from 1949, when an obsessed fan lured a big-league first baseman to her hotel room and shot him.

In the novel The Natural, what does a stranger named Iris Lemon do in the crowd to end Roy Hobbs's slump?

She stands up in a red dress amid the seated crowd, and Hobbs answers with the home run that breaks his slump. He later drops her for Memo Paris.

In The Natural, how is Memo Paris, the woman Roy Hobbs pursues, related to manager Pop Fisher?

His niece, and Pop warns Hobbs off her as a jinx: she was the girlfriend of the star whose death opened a place in the lineup.

Which actor played the bookie Gus Sands in The Natural but, after a dispute, took no screen credit?

Darren McGavin, fresh from playing the father in A Christmas Story, refused a credit even when the director later offered to add one.

Which future Reservoir Dogs actor played Bump Bailey, the lazy star slugger in The Natural?

Michael Madsen's character has taken the Judge's money to coast, and Hobbs's first big-league hit comes as a pinch hitter in his place.

The star of The Natural had recently won a Best Director Oscar for which family drama, his first film as director?

Ordinary People won four Oscars, including Best Picture, and its director then stayed off screen until this baseball film brought him back.

Which sci-fi series nodded to The Natural with The Unnatural, an episode about an alien who loves baseball?

The X-Files handed the episode to its star David Duchovny, who wrote and directed the tale of an alien hiding in the Negro leagues in 1947 Roswell.

The author of The Natural won a Pulitzer Prize for which later novel about a Jewish prisoner in Tsarist Russia?

The Fixer retells the real Beilis murder case of 1913 and won both the Pulitzer and the National Book Award, a rare double.

The author of The Natural was born to immigrant grocers in which New York City borough?

Brooklyn was where his Russian Jewish parents ran a string of grocery stores, the world he later put into his second novel, The Assistant.

Which cinematographer earned an Oscar nomination for The Natural, whose flashbacks he gave a faded old-photograph look?

Caleb Deschanel, father of actresses Zooey and Emily, got the faded glow by blending a black-and-white print with a color-boosted one, imitating early autochrome photographs.

In the 1984 film The Natural, which position does Roy Hobbs take over after Bump Bailey's death?

Right field becomes his once the star is gone, and the one-time teenage pitcher's hitting pulls the last-place club up the league.

In the novel The Natural, what revelation about Iris Lemon, who is only 33, makes Roy Hobbs lose interest?

She is a grandmother at 33, and the word alone repels him: when it turns up again in her letter, he crumples the page and discards it.

Which Phillies first baseman, shot by an obsessed fan in 1949, is often cited as a model for Roy Hobbs?

Eddie Waitkus was nicknamed the natural as a rookie, survived the shooting and came back the next season as the Phillies' leadoff hitter.

At the end of the novel The Natural, what does Roy Hobbs do with the Judge's bribe money?

Throws it in his face, then beats him with his fists; but the gesture comes too late, because a newspaper is already printing the story of the sellout.

In the novel The Natural, how does Roy Hobbs dazzle Memo Paris and Gus Sands after losing bets to the bookie?

Magic tricks are his surprise talent, and they seem to impress the woman who otherwise keeps him at arm's length for most of the book.

Which actor, famous as the sheriff in Walking Tall, played the Whammer in the 1984 film The Natural?

Joe Don Baker's slugger is humbled by a teenager nobody has heard of, a defeat that draws the eye of the woman who then turns her gun on the winner.

The score of The Natural is often compared to the style of which American composer?

Aaron Copland is the usual comparison, so much so that Newsweek's reviewer called the music Coplandesque; it also uses Wagner-style recurring themes.

The author of The Natural wrote the novel while teaching freshman composition at which Pacific Northwest university?

Oregon State would not let him teach literature because he had no PhD, so he taught composition and kept three days a week for his own writing.

In the novel The Natural, which physical trait marks out Gus Sands, the bookie who helps arrange the fix?

A glass eye marks the gambler who enjoys betting against Hobbs and finally talks him into taking a dive in the last game.

The aging 1937 ballpark that played the New York home ground in The Natural was known locally by which nickname?

The Rockpile earned its name through poor upkeep, and it was demolished in 1989, a few years after doubling as a 1930s big-league park.

Which Hill Street Blues actor played the Judge, the scheming co-owner who tries to bribe Roy Hobbs in The Natural?

Robert Prosky's Judge turns to threats when the bribe fails, vowing to release photographs of the dead woman who shot Hobbs and pin her death on him.