American Pastime
Love of Country, Family, Jazz and the Great Game of Baseball Creates
Japanese American Heroes Against All Odds in
Inspiring Film Set in U.S. Internment Camps
Premiering May 22 on Warner Home Video DVD, Movie
stars Gary Cole, Leonardo Nam and Aaron Yoo
and is produced by
High School Musical’s Barry Rosenbush
 Burbank,
Calif., February 19, 2007 – American Pastime -- a
powerful, inspiring drama revealing a rarely considered side of the
World War II Japanese American experience -- will be seen for the first
time when Warner Home Video presents it on DVD May 22. From filmmaker
Desmond Nakano (Boulevard Nights, Last Exit to Brooklyn) and set
against the background of the 1940’s U.S. internment camps, the film
weaves a rich story of a Japanese-American father and his two sons,
whose love of family, country, music and the game of baseball help them
find the strength to survive indignity and injustice. The DVD, which
will include a making-of featurette and theatrical trailer, will sell
for $19.98 SRP. Orders are due April 17.
American
Pastime
takes
viewers into the lives of the Japanese American community at a time when
their very foundations were shaken to the core. Adding elements of
humor, romance and action, the film is based on the true
events of World War II’s U.S. home front, where nearly a quarter of a
million Japanese Americans, though citizens of this country, were
uprooted from their homes and placed in remote internment camps because
of a perceived security threat. The film’s story centers around one
family in Utah’s Topaz camp where the interned community ironically uses
baseball, for decades a part of the Japanese American fabric, as a way
to rise above their daily hardships and adversity.
Gary Cole
(HBO’s upcoming “12 Miles of Bad Road,” Talladega Nights,
Office Space) stars in American Pastime, which also
features Leonardo Nam (The Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift, Vantage Point),
Aaron Yoo (Disturbia, TV’s “Bedford Diaries”), Masatoshi Nakamura
(famed Japanese actor and singer), Judy Ongg Okina (renowned
international performer) and Sarah Drew (TV’s “Everwood,” Radio)
and Jon Gries (Napoleon Dynamite).
Synopsis
Kaz Nomura
(Masatoshi Nakamura) and his wife Emi (Judy Ongg) stoically struggle to
maintain a normal life after being forcibly relocated to an internment
camp in the remote town of Abraham, Utah. Although allowed to run
errands in the town – under supervision – the camp residents are
imprisoned behind wire fences and overseen by armed guards.
The Nomura
sons Lane (Leonardo Nam) and Lyle (Aaron Yoo) are totally Americanized
and they rebel loudly against their unfair captivity. The older brother
Lane, determined to prove his loyalty, enlists in the U.S. Army’s
celebrated 442nd Regimental Combat Team (the unit’s slogan is “Go For
Broke,” symbolizing the men’s at-all-cost fight for freedom). His
brother Lyle is a musician and a baseball superstar who’s embittered
when his chance to attend college on a full baseball scholarship is cut
short by the War. Lyle soon meets Katie Burrell (Sarah Drew), daughter
of camp guard Billy Burrell (Gary Cole), and the two teenagers begin a
romance. Katie’s brother is overseas fighting in the Pacific, which
brings Lyle and Katie's relationship onto a collision course with her
dad’s worst wartime fears. When the romance between Katie and Lyle is
discovered, the Burrells and the Nomuras find themselves at odds with
each other, even though they’re on the same side of the war.
Billy
Burrell, a man whose dream is one more shot at the big leagues, is a
star of the minor league baseball club, the Abraham Bees. If not for the
war, baseball is a passion he could have shared with Kaz and his sons,
who also play for the love of the game.
To show
the town of Abraham their fighting spirit, the camp residents propose a
baseball game between Billy's team and the Topaz camp's squad and both
sides square off in a contest. An unusual wager is proposed, the stakes
of which are a large sum of money for the locals; dignity and honor for
the Japanese Americans. Lane, having made a devastating wartime
sacrifice, comes back from the front to cheer the players to “Go For
Broke.” Alongside him, the internment camp families unite behind their
team, determined to show that they, too, are patriotic Americans. And
through the all-American pastime of baseball, the town of Abraham and
the Topaz detainees discover that they’re really not that different
after all – they’re both Americans who share the same values, even when
a war almost tears them apart.
Historical
Background
The
internment of Japanese Americans during World War II was one of the
worst violations of civil rights in the history of the United States.
After Pearl Harbor, more Japanese attacks on the U.S were feared. Bowing
to community pressures (primarily from the West Coast), President
Roosevelt, on this day exactly 65 years ago, signed Executive Order
9066, which resulted in the forcible internment of 120,000 people of
Japanese ancestry. The government and the Army, using the term "military
necessity," locked up men, women and children in 10 remote camps in
isolated desert areas of Arizona, California, Utah, Idaho, Colorado,
Wyoming and Arkansas. By the end of the war, however, after being
incarcerated for up to four years – surrounded by barbed wire and armed
guards - not one of these U.S. citizens was ever convicted or charged
with any crime.
Despite
internment, Japanese Americans also fought and died in the war.
Initially classified as 4-C (“enemy aliens ineligible for the military),
Japanese Americans proved to be so skillful they were eventually allowed
to serve in the U.S. Army. The 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the
United States Army was their unit, and they fought in North Africa,
Italy, southern France, and Germany. The “Go For Broke” unit became one
of the most highly decorated in U.S. Military history. In a strange
twist of fate, 5,000 survivors of the Jewish concentration camp Dachau
were liberated by members of the 442nd on April 29, 1945.
Executive
Order 9066 was rescinded by President Roosevelt in 1944, and the last of
the camps was closed in March, 1946. In 1988, President Reagan signed
legislation apologizing for the internment on behalf of the U.S.
government and reparations were paid to surviving internees. In recent
years, the Congress has adopted legislation authorizing up to $38
million in federal funds to preserve and restore the 10 internment camps
and 17 assembly centers as historical landmarks.
Credits
American
Pastime
screenplay
is by Desmond Nakano & Tony Kayden. Barry Rosenbush, who executive
produced the 6-time Emmy-nominated hit “High School Musical,” produced
along with Tom Gorai and Terry Spazek. David Skinner and Arata
Matsushima are executive producers and Kerry Yo Nakagawa, associate
producer. Director of photography is Matthew Williams; Mark Yoshikawa
is the editor. Production Designer is Christopher Demuri. Casting by
Vickie Thomas - Los Angeles. Composer is Joseph Conlan, with baritone
saxophone solos by Verdi (Woody) Woodward contributing to the score.
American Pastime is a Warner Home Video
presentation of a T & C Pictures, ShadowCatcher Entertainment, Rosy
Bushes production of a Desmond Nakano film.
AMERICAN
PASTIME
Street Date: May 22, 2007
Order Due Date: April 17, 2007
Catalog #: 115632
$19.98 SRP
Not Yet Rated
Run Time: 105 minutes
With operations in 90 international territories, Warner Home Video, a
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About Japanese and
Japanese American Baseball
An
Integral Part of the Japanese American Experience
 Baseball
in Japan and Japanese American Baseball have existed for more than 100
years.
Baseball
was introduced to Japan in 1872 by an American schoolteacher working
there at the time Japan was forging ties with America and other
countries, after three centuries of feudal isolationism. As one Japanese
writer put it, “Baseball is perfect for us. If the Americans hadn’t
invented it, we would have.”
Young
Japanese boys embraced the new game and by 1905 college baseball was
Japan’s number one sport. Professional teams were instituted in 1935
and now every year some 25 million fans faithfully visit the ballparks.
It was, in fact, Japan that won last year’s first inaugural World
Baseball Classic.
Japanese
baseball came to this country during the last decades of the 19th
Century. The first Japanese immigrants (called Issei) brought with them
a passion for the game and knowledge that made them stand out among
other immigrants. The Issei built their own ballparks and formed their
own teams as early at 1903. Seattle, Los Angeles and Honolulu all had
teams by 1905 and organized leagues by 1910.
With the
birth here of second-generation Japanese American children (Nisei),
baseball grew even more popular, reflecting renewed optimism at finding
a place in America. The Nisei eventually joined Japanese American
baseball teams and semi-pro leagues, and from Mexico to Canada, from
Hawaii to Nebraska, grandstands overflowed with fans. All-star teams
played in Japan, Korea and Manchuria and competed in exhibition games
with minor league clubs and all-stars from the Negro and Major Leagues.
They shared fields with legends Babe Ruth,
Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige and many other
stars. Nisei baseball was at its height and the 1920s and 1930s were
dubbed its Golden Age.
Following
Pearl Harbor, baseball went behind barbed wire after President
Roosevelt’s February, 1942 Executive Order resulted in the forcible
internment of 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry. Baseball played a
major role in creating a sense of normalcy for the internees. All 10
internment camps established teams; one camp had a year-round baseball
league with 32 teams and championship games that drew crowds of
thousands.
After the
war, Japanese Americans started leagues again, but the landscape was now
severely altered. The first generation Issei, baseball’s most
passionate fans, had passed away; many of the of top players had
opportunities to play at higher levels in college and even
professionally in Japan; and opportunities in mainstream culture for the
younger third-generation Japanese Americans (Sansei) eroded the social
need for these leagues.
The first
Japanese national to play in the major leagues was Masanori Murakami who
was signed by the San Francisco Giants in 1963. A Japanese American
finally made it to the major leagues in 1975, when Hawaiian born Ryan
Kurosaki made his pitching debut as a St. Louis Cardinal. Ryan’s
teammate in Hawaii was Lenn Sakata who, two years later, would become
the first Japanese American position player with the Milwaukee Brewers.
Eighteen years after that, pitcher Hideo Nomo joined the Los Angeles
Dodgers, became Rookie of the Year and changed the way Americans saw
Japanese, Japanese American and other Asian players. (Japanese American
Wally Yonamine, hired by the San Francisco 49ers in 1947, was the first
NFL player of Japanese ancestry. He went on to become the first
American to play professional baseball in Japan and the only American
ever inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.)
Players
from Japan on Major League Baseball teams this season are All Star
Ichiro Suzuki, Kenji Jojima (Seattle Mariners); All star Hideki Matsui,
Kei Igawa (New York Yankees); Takashi Saito (L.A. Dodgers); Daisuke
Matsuzaka, Hideki Okajima (Boston Red Sox); Kaz Matsui (Colorado
Rockies); Tadahito Iguchi (Chicago White Sox) and So Taguchi (St Louis
Cardinals).
Based on
the writings of Kerry Yo Nakagawa, Associate Producer of
The
American Pastime”
and author of “Through a Diamond: 100 Years of Japanese American
Baseball”; and on “A Century of Japanese American Baseball” by
Gary T. Otake |
Powerful
story about the dramatic impact WWII had in the home-front as Japanese
American families were uprooted from their every day lives and placed
into internment camps in Western US in the early 1940's. Faced with a
country that now doubted their loyalty and struggling with their new
situation, they turn to baseball as a way to handle their plight and
find the strength to stand up for themselves becoming a true symbol of
honor and pride.
