Category Archives: Billiards TV

The Billiards TV category is about television episodes that prominently feature billiards or have plots centered around billiards.

A Trio of Titans: Mosconi, Hoppe, Van Boeing

Leave a reply

Sports biopics are a staple of Hollywood. They run the gamut from ultra-popular sports, such as football (e.g., Remember the Titans; Invincible), basketball (e.g., Glory Road; Hoosiers), and baseball (e.g., 42; Price of the Yankees) to those far more niche, such as horse racing (e.g., Seabiscuit), surfing (e.g., Soul Surfer), and ski jumping (e.g., Eddie the Eagle).  

You guessed it. There are no billiards biopics. 

Fortunately, over the years, a variety of companies have stepped in to honor some of the greats of the sport with short documentaries.  Though these films vary considerably in production quality and entertainment value, they all deserve some praise for attempting to preserve on-screen the legends of the baize.

Years ago, I wrote about the 2013 Sky Sports Productions documentary, The Strickland Story, focused on Earl Strickland, as well as the Probe Profile on Efren Reyes.  Today, I’ll turn my attention to Willie Mosconi, Willie Hoppe, and Shane Van Boeing, each the subject of a billiard short film. Also, in a future blog post, I’ll jump across the channel and review the documentaries on snooker stars Alex Higgins (Alex Higgins: The People’s Champion) and Ali Carter (Ali Carter: The Unbreakable).

A Pete Smith Specialty: The Mosconi Story

At 1621 Vine Street, on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, there is a star honoring Pete Smith, an Oscar-winning  American producer and narrator of short subject films. Between 1931 and 1955, Mr. Smith made more than 150 movies that covered everything from household hints to insect life to military training.  The majority, however, were short comedic documentaries that he narrated.  This includes one of his final films, The Mosconi Story, about the life of perhaps the greatest pool player in history, “Mr. Pocket Billiards” William Joseph Mosconi. It is available to watch here.

Created in 1952, this 10-minute film is a reenactment of Mr. Mosconi’s life, starting when “Little Wille” would skip his violin lessons to practice billiards at Joe Mosconi’s Billiards Parlor using a sawed-off broom handle and potatoes. By age 7, Mr. Mosconi was traveling, doing exhibitions.  His career climbed quickly, eventually taking him to the Worlds Pocket Billiards Championship on six occasions.  But, he did not win any of those matches.

Most of The Mosconi Story takes places In 1941, when Mr. Mosconi opted to give it one more try.  With a child on the way, his billiards career was headed either for the “championship or the want ads.” As billiards historians know well, he made it to the finals to compete against three time world champion Andrew Ponzi, one of the “real greats of the day, the craftiest player in the game.” 

Neck and neck with Mr. Ponzi, Mr. Mosconi’s game is interrupted by a telegram telling him that his baby boy, Willie Jr., had arrived early.  That announcement gives Mr. Mosconi the confidence to attempt a five-cushion rail shot.  He makes the shot, winning 125-124, and becomes the world champion.  It was a feat he would repeat many times.

Columbia Pictures presents the Willie Hoppe Story

Released in 1954, The Willie Hoppe Story is a nine-minute mash-up of documentary and exhibition. The first 60 seconds is biographic, a whirlwind time travel from 1896, when Mr. Hoppe began playing billiards at the age of eight, to the present (1954), when a 66-year-old Mr. Hoppe starts showing off his three-cushion carom billiards skills at the world-renowned New York Athletic Club. It is available to watch here.

First, he dispatches with his opponent, New York professional billiards champion Edward Lee.  Then, he demonstrates the essentials of billiards, such as the proper grip and techniques for creating spin. Finally, he brings the real magic, showing off more than 20 eye-popping, three-cushion (or more) carom billiards shots, including a nine-cushion shot. 

Narrator Bill Stern, who thirty years later would join the inaugural class of the American Sportscasters Association Hall of Fame, can barely contain his euphoria watching the shots made by the “wizard of the cue, the king of the cushion, Willie Hoppe.”  He proclaims that Mr. Hoppe is “no professor of billiards, he’s a professor of English [spin],” and he describes one shot that navigates 25 bowling pins on the table as a “Sunday driver going to the picnic grounds.”

Shane Van Boeing – The South Dakota Kid

Given the number of billiards titles, championships and accolades accumulated by Rapid City’s Shane Van Boeing, it’s no wonder South Dakota Public Broadcasting produced this eight-minute segment in 2014 for its Dakota Life series focused on “interesting South Dakota people, places, and things.”  You can watch it here.

Mr. Van Boeing was only 31 years old in 2014, but he was already a six-time US Open champion, the 2008 doubles world champion, a two-time all around champion, a seven-time Mosconi Cup member, and the “current #1 pool player in the US.” (His accomplishments have only further proliferated in the past seven years.)

Shane Van Boeing initially takes a fairly standard approach to his life. He grew up in a pool-playing family, sitting in the baby chair watching pool and then getting his first table at age two from his grandfather. Soon he was participating in trick shot exhibitions.

But rather than continuing down memory lane and charting Mr. Van Boeing’s path to turning pro in 2006, Shane Van Boeing instead chooses to narrowly focus on his hearing impairment, with his mother, Timi Bloomberg, describing how she realized when Shane was 16 months old that he was almost totally deaf.  She describes being very careful that her son not get labeled as “handicapped,” insisting that he surrounds himself with “speaking people” to “function normal.” 

Mr. Van Boeing elaborates, saying he was bullied in school for his hearing impairment, but when he played pool, it was a different world where he didn’t have to worry about that. He says he really learned to communicate in the pool room – “this is where I got my better communication.”

Incredulously, Mr. Van Boeing says some opponents have derided his impairment as an “advantage,” indicating it’s “not fair” that he isn’t distracted by external sounds.  His retort: “put in earplugs, you’ll be just like me.”

In a wonderful closing note, he shares how he wants to be a role model for the hearing impaired. Kids can look up to him and think “I don’t have to be handicapped. I can utilize my disability to have ability in other areas.”

Pick Pockets

Leave a reply

I was not familiar with the English television presenter and comedian Tom O’Connor, who died from Parkinson’s about two months ago. But, an alert about his passing showed up in my news feed because in addition to hosting such popular British game shows as Crosswits, Name that Tune, and Password, he also hosted a snooker-themed game show called Pick Pockets.

What was this?

Of course, there have been snooker-themed game shows, such as Pot the Question from 1984 or the widely popular Big Break, which ran from 1991-2002, but this one had clearly eluded my research. Wikipedia lists over 500 British game shows, but there’s no mention of Pick Pockets.  Nor does it appear on the British Game Show Wiki, the website UK Game Shows, or searching the BBC. Yet, sure enough, there on YouTube, user gareth11077 had posted the pilot episode from 1988.  You can watch it here.

Fortunately, I was able to contact gareth11077, who I subsequently learned was Gareth McGinley, author of Heart Breaks: The Tony Knowles Story, and a self-described enthusiast and researcher of ‘80s snooker. Through my email exchange with him, as well as a separate email exchange with Trevor Chance, the creator of Pick Pockets (as well as the founder of Legends, Europe’s longest running live tribute show), I learned that the show I had watched was an untransmitted pilot, as the series actually never aired. The hope was to get it onto ITV, but the network’s commissioner at the time, Greg Dyke, allegedly had a particular dislike for snooker that not only left Pick Pockets homeless, but more important, signaled a “death knell of snooker on ITV, as well.”

According to Mr. Chance, Pick Pockets was inspired by a game of snooker he was playing (and was not influenced by its forbearer Pot the Question). Produced by Tyne Tees, the ITV television franchise for Northeast England, the show combined “the knowledge of our teams with the snooker skills of our guest professionals,” as Mr. O’Connor shared in his opening.

Pick Pockets had two competing teams, each pairing a local contestant with a celebrity. In the pilot episode, the celebrities were TV actor George Layton and English women’s cricket captain Rachel Heyhoe Flint. The teams, in turn, were each paired with a professional snooker player.  The episode’s two players were John Parrott, who one year later would lose the World Snooker Championship to Steve Davis, and the “Silver Fox” David Taylor, a familiar face in the ‘80s though after 1980 he never made it past the quarterfinals of the World Championship.  Completing the celebrity lineup was Len Ganley, the show’s “resident referee” and scorekeeper (who refereed four World Championships between 1983 and 1993).

(At the end of the episode, the audience is promised that next week’s episode – which was never made – would star Alex Higgins and Willie Throne, two true giants of the sport.  Oh well.)

Gameplay begins by each snooker player breaking their opponent’s rack. The 15 red balls have no value; they are obstacles to interfere with potting the colored balls and can be removed in the first round by each team correctly answering trivia questions, such as “how many toes does a rhinoceros have? (three) or “what is a jumbuck to an Australian?” (a sheep).

Once a ball is removed for each correct answer, round two begins. In this round, the players seek to pot the colored balls in order, while avoiding the remaining red balls. The pockets have different point values, and points are earned by a combination of answering a trivia question and potting the ball.  The team that has the most points advances to the third round.

In this final round, the non-celebrity contestant must answer six trivia questions. Each right answer earns his snooker-playing teammate 10 seconds to run a table consisting of the six colored balls. The player wants to leave as much time on the clock because once the table is run, the remaining time will be used to pot a single gold ball, which is worth 1000 pounds (or approximately $1700 USD in 1988).

While clearly dated through today’s viewing lens, the show was entertaining and had a certain imbued charm, principally due to Mr. O’Connor’s jovial banter. It’s a shame it never aired. Evidently, the ingredients were right, as Big Break proved only a few years later with a format that is uncannily similar to Pick Pockets.

Top 7 Billiards Companies Starring in TV and Movies

Leave a reply

It’s hard to overstate the financial impact of effective product placement in television and film. After Tom Cruise wore Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses in Risky Business, sales of the model increased from 18,000 to 4 million. Hershey saw a 65% increase in profits after a famous extraterrestrial took a liking to Reese’s Pieces in E.T. And Toy Story provided a 4500% boost to sales of Etch A Sketch immediately after the film’s release.

Regrettably, billiards manufacturers and artisans cannot point to similar successes. (In fact, probably the most famous billiards product placement was in The Color of Money when Vincent crowed about his Balabushka, but that was actually a Joss cue!)

But if pristine product placement has proved elusive, there are a handful of compelling examples of billiards industry makers who have “broken the first wall,” stepping out of the product shadows to become the star of their own episode, specifically television documentary and science reality series.  Here’s my list, from worst to best, of the Top 7 Billiards Companies Starring in TV and Movies.

  1. Falcon Cue Ltd. Seven slow minutes elapse before viewers of the low-budget How Its Made episode, “Air Filters, Billiard Cues, Ice Sculptures Suits,” learn that the cues getting assembled belong to Falcon, the Canadian cue company launched in the early 1990s. This lifeless 2005 episode plays like a high-school-made how-to video, with 15 separate steps detailed, from step one (use a circular donut-shaped lathe to turn a block of maple into a cylindrical cue butt) to step 15 (buff the cue stick). Fortunately for Falcon, step 12 addresses using a motorized stamping machine to apply the company logo.
  2. Thurston. The oldest snooker table manufacturer in the world, Thurston features in “The Bow, Ferrofluid, The Billiard Table” episode of Incredible Inventions from 2017. Viewers are walked through the step-by-step process of assembling a table, from selecting the timber and cutting the wood to ironing the table cloth and fitting the cushions.
  3. Albany-Hyatt Billiard Ball Company. Don Wildman, host of Mysteries at the Museum, searches museums for relics that “reveal the secrets of our past.” In the 2018 “Lunar Fender Bender, Opera Angels and Billiard Balls” episode, he travels to the Albany Institute of History and Art, which features a 140-year-old box of the Hyatt Company’s 16 balls. Though the company went out of business in 1986, it carries the name of John Wesley Hyatt, whose invention of the celluloid billiard ball to replace the ivory ball revitalized the industry (and saved a lot of elephants). The story of that invention, and the company that followed, is told in the episode through a mix of historian voice-overs and actor dramatizations. Fun fact: Hyatt’s original celluloid billiard ball almost failed when the sound it made hitting another ball was too similar to a gunshot. Saloon owners freaked and canceled purchases, forcing Hyatt to update his formula by adding camphor to the mix. The rest is billiards history.
  4. The Cuemaker - Billiards DocumentaryDana Paul Cues. Paul, a maker of pool cues and espresso tampers in upstate New York, is the star of Gary Chin’s short documentary, The Cuemaker. Mr. Chin, a film student at Ithaca College, is on the hunt for the perfect 19.5-oz jump break cue. His quest leads him to Mr. Paul, who is committed to “cue-making perfection” and shares, “I am not attached to [a] particular piece of wood…I’m attached to the idea that it will become, it not treasured, at least respected by you or maybe even your children.”
  5. Valley-Dynamo, Inc. In the world of coin-operated pool tables, Valley-Dynamo is a household name. Unsurprisingly, when the producers of Machines: How They Work wanted to tackle coin-operated tables, they turned to Valley-Dynamo. Airing on The Science Channel in 2016, the “Pool Tables, Gas Fired Boilers and Shopping Carts” episode combined photo-real CGI with factory footage to highlight the assembly of the dead rail, the mechanics of the coin recognition slot, and the interior “spider web of runways” that transport the balls.
  6. Chuck Jacobi, Best Billiards. In 2016, Jill Wagner, the perky host of Handcrafted America, traveled to New Jersey to learn how Mr. Jacobi, a former military contractor, makes his customized billiards tables. (Viewers may recognize Ms. Wagner as the former host of Wipeout or scantily clad on the pages of lad mags such as Stuff and FHM.) Airing on INSP, the “Woven Rugs, Sunglasses and Billiard Tables” episode from season one featured Mr. Jacobi assembling a frame, “ripping” the rails, creating inlays out of the keys of antique abandoned pianos, and converting a dining room table into a billiards table. His customized tables retail for $3000-$18,000, not including Ms. Wagner’s assistance routing the end piece.
  7. Richard Black Custom Cues. Back in 2005, the television series The Genuine Article answered its question, “Who makes the most beautiful pool cues?” by profiling Hall of Fame cuemaker Richard Black. On the “Puzzles and Pool Cues” episode, Mr. Black discusses his Antipodes cue, with 600 inlays and made from 16 different types of wood from 16 different countries. “Gentleman Jack” Colavita is also interviewed, unequivocally calling Mr. Black the best cue-maker.

So, for billiards companies thinking about how to optimize the return on spend from their marketing budget, it might be time to pursue a starring role on TV or in the movies.

**************

An abridged version of this article originally appeared in BCA Insider (Spring issue, May 2021)

The Goldbergs – “Bad Companions”

Leave a reply

In 1956, billiards was still relatively novel to most Jewish-Americans.  Consider some of the Jews who have made an indelible contribution on the sport.[i] Barry Berhrman, the founder of the prestigious U.S. Open 9-Ball Championship, had just turned 10. Billiards Congress of America Hall of Famer Mike Sigel, whose mother used to complain that he wouldn’t go to Hebrew school because he was too tired from playing pool, was just starting to walk up stairs unassisted. Pool Wars author Jay Helfert is one of the game’s great chroniclers, but at best, he was still a little ankle-biter at that time.

Then, it’s hardly surprising that the 1956 episode “Bad Companions” of the TV sitcom The Goldbergs might find humor in Uncle David (Eli Mintz), a nebbish who has purchased a pool table at an auction but not knowing how to play, enlists the help of some pool hall locals to teach him the game.[ii]

In fact, the bigger surprise might be that such a Jewish sitcom existed at all.  Sure enough, The Goldbergs, created in 1948 by radio star Gertrude Berg, was not only television’s first family sitcom, but also a show squarely and confidently about a Jewish family. Ms. Berg, the show’s writer, producer, and star actress, played the family matriarch, Molly Goldberg.

According to columnist Matthue Roth, Ms. Berg’s “vision of The Goldbergs, from which the show never deviated, was that of an everyday family with simple interactions, believable plots, and guided by a gentle humor. The episodes followed a predictable pattern–family members encounter problems, land in tight spots, and then turn to their familial matriarch to bail them out.”[1]

In “Bad Companions,” Uncle David’s new pool table, a “fabulous gift for the whole family,” becomes a bit of a headache, since his peers either don’t know how to play or aren’t permitted to play by their spouses. Justifying his unfamiliarity with billiards, the family patriarch, Jake (Robert H. Harris), says, “pool is a game that requires leisure, it’s not something you’re born with.”

Undeterred, David recruits a well-mannered gaggle of locals from the Friendly Nook pool hall, paying them to come to his house and teach him pool and promising to be the “best pupil [they] ever had.” While not exactly Machiavellian hustlers, the “professors” – Stosh, Big Louie, Little Louie, Cockeye Mike, and Snake Hip Nellie– show little interest in letting David practice; instead, they take advantage of his family’s hospitality, playing pool for free and delighting in a never-ending buffet of sandwiches and coffee. More attention is given to the composition of the sandwiches (e.g., “cheese on rye with mustard, not so much lettuce”) than to the mechanics of the billiards game.

Tensions start to run high among Uncle David’s family members who feel their magnanimity is being exploited, especially when some of the teachers start using the Goldberg’s phone to place horse racing bets. When Jake finally ejects Uncle David’s friends from his house, David goes down to the pool hall to make amends, only to unwittingly get ensnared in a raid. The judge releases David, calling him the “dupe of unsavory characters” and the product of a poor upbringing.

To show all is not lost, and to prove that Molly is hardly just a naïve sandwich-maker, the episode ends with Molly and David playing a game of pool. Like a pro, Molly announces her shot will “kiss the four ball off the nine and into the side pocket.” It’s a combination designed to impress, though discerning audiences will wonder why there is no sound of a ball falling in the pocket.

The Goldbergs may have had little impact on the future of billiards, but there is no question that Gertrude Berg was a true trailblazer.  Her inspiring comedic style earned her the first Best Actress Emmy in 1951, and laid the groundwork for future comedians, such as Lucille Ball, as well as the domestic family sitcom genre, creating a blueprint for subsequent shows like Leave It to Beaver and Father Knows Best.

Until very recently, “Bad Companions” was available to watch on Jewish Life Television (JLTV), the network founded in 2007 to promote Jewish-themed programming.

[1]      “Jewish Film: The Goldbergs,” by Matthue Roth.

[i]       While it’s hard to argue that “Boston Shorty” Morton Goldberg had an “indelible” influence on billiards, I’d be remiss if I did not give him a special shoutout. Boston Shorty was 40 years old when “Bad Companions” aired. By that time, he had already defeated legends such as Willie Mosconi, Ralph Greenley, Irving Crane, and Jimmie Caras. And, no, The Goldbergs was not named after Boston Shorty.

[ii]       The Goldbergs should not be confused with the currently-running, identically-named ABC sitcom The Goldbergs.

Table Plays – “The Waiting Game”

Leave a reply

In the arts, billiards and death are often interlocked.

“A Game of Pool,” the 1961 episode of The Twilight Zone, pits the best living pool player against the best dead pool player in a contest where the winner earns the title of greatest pool player ever, and the loser forfeits his life.

Two years later, in the poem “We Real Cool,” Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Gwendolyn Brooks tells the story of seven pool players at the Golden Shovel: “We Real cool. | We Left school. | We Lurk late. | We Strike straight. | We Sing sin. | We Thin gin. | We Jazz June. | We Die soon.”

The aptly-titled anime short film Death Billiards, created in 2013, focuses on two men who must compete for their lives in a game of pool. The gotcha is they’re both already dead and the match is to determine who is headed for heaven or hell.

Into this global smorgasbord of billiards macabre we should add “The Waiting Game,” a 30-minute television drama that aired in November 2008 on Maori Television in New Zealand. “The Waiting Game” was one-sixth of Table Plays, a grassroots series of low-budget dramas, funded by NZ On Air, that paired emerging writers with established directors, and relied on local crews, actors, and settings.

Written by Rebecca Tansley and directed by Anna Marbrook, “The Waiting Game” envisions purgatory as a one-table snooker room where two players compete.  The winner gets to live, the loser moves on. The episode focuses on a match between a distraught single mother (Eilish Moran), who has just arrived and refuses to believe her fate will be resolved by a snooker game, and a celebrated TV actor (Ben Farry), who is impatient to get back to his life.  But, a lot of conversation and soul-searching can occur over a game of snooker, and while the winner of the match may be obvious, the outcome is less so.

Due to the cramped locale and the tight ping-pong of dialogue among the two players, and the third character, a Purgatory rule enforcer-cum-maître d’ (Rima Te Wiata), “The Waiting Game” feels more like a one-act theater production than a television episode. And, while I wish the snooker-playing had been far more convincing, I appreciated the original storyline and its ability to create tension independent of the match.

But, I have to admit to a strong degree of bias, for a good degree of my viewing joy was attributable to the circuitous journey I had locating the episode and the most amiable and facilitative cast of individuals who contributed to my quest.

That search first began in early 2019 when I reached out the writer Ms. Tansley. Replying immediately, she shared that she did not have a copy of “The Waiting Game” but encouraged me to connect with Richard Thomas, the executive producer of Table Plays and a 30-year veteran of New Zealand television production.

Unable to reach Mr. Thomas, I put the search on the backburner for about a year until last April, when I attempted to find a different inroad, this time by contacting the New Zealand Film Commission. The people at NZFC could not have been friendlier, and while they too couldn’t connect me to Mr. Thomas, they did put me in touch with the director, Ms. Marbrook.

Ms. Marbrook graciously shared with me more history about “The Waiting Game” and then added that the master file had been sent to the local television station in Dunedin, New Zealand, as they did a subsequent airing of the full Table Plays series.

After some further on-the-ground sleuthing by Ms. Marbrook and Ms. Tansley, they encouraged me to reach out to 39 Southern Television, the local station formerly known as Dunedin Television and Channel 9. That prompt led me to connect with Luke Chapman, the Production Manager, who warmly recalled working on the show and the “clever script from Rebecca.” Mr. Chapman indicated he only had “The Waiting Game” on DVD. After ascertaining my intentions were good, Mr. Chapman agreed to convert the DVD into a format I could watch. Two months later, he published in the July 26 Otago Daily Times (which, in addition to 39 Southern Television, is owned by Allied Press) a link to the episode. You can now watch it here.

Thank you to everyone who helped me locate “The Waiting Game.” As was often written to me during the numerous email exchanges, kia ora tatou.

Next Time, Don’t Skip Science: The Physics of Billiards

1 Reply

As the 1959 animated short film Donald in Mathmagic Land taught us, billiards is a game of mathematics, specifically of angles.  Remembering that the angles of incidence and reflection are the same, or understanding the table’s diamond system, benefits a player greatly.

Every bit as important as the mathematics, however, is the science. The physics of billiards is critical to the game, as the sport is all about transferring energy from the cue ball to an object ball.  A player’s ability to leverage the two forces at work – linear momentum and angular momentum – separates the top athletes from the rest of the pack.

Think such wonkish topics don’t make for compelling entertainment? Think again. At least three different documentary television series have delved into the science to bring these concepts to life. Those series are Time Warp, Discover Science, and Outrageous Acts of Science.  Let’s dive in.

Time Warp

Time Warp, the oldest of the three series, first aired on the Discovery Chanel in the United States in March 2008.  The series features MIT scientist Jeff Lieberman and cameraman Matt Kearney using high-speed cameras to capture and slow down everyday events for the purpose of understanding the physics.

The first-season “Samurai Sword Master” episode (November, 2008) examines the physics behind various cue strokes made by billiards professional Liz Ford. (At the time, Ms. Ford was a top-ranked pro on the Women’s Professional Billiard Association tour. She has since retired from competitive pool to run the Green Mountain APA Pool League, as well as write articles for PoolDawg, a sponsor of my blog.)

The first shot is the break, examined at 170x slower than normal speed.  This is followed by her stop spin and massé shots.  The highlight is watching her backspin shot, “time-warped at 2000 frames/second,” which enables the viewer to see the cue ball rotate five times before finally retracing its path backwards. Even Ms. Ford seems impressed.  The full episode is available to watch here.

Discover Science

Discover Science is a DVD series from 2012 that focuses on “spectacular experiments to sharpen your sense of science.” Starting with the first episode that sought to explain how 500 eggs could support the weight of a 1700 pound camel, the series utilized a team of “Experiment Rangers” to lead the experiments through trial and error and ultimately demonstrate the physical laws of nature.

“Let’s Play Long Billiards,” the 11th episode in the series, seeks to answer the question “how long does force travel?” by shooting a cue ball into an ever-increasing number of billiards balls. Professional billiards player Hideaki Arita (currently ranked #52 in Japanese Professional Billiards Association) joins the experiment as the expert cue ball stroker.

The episode begins with the experiment of shooting a cue ball into 16-foot long consecutive line of 90 balls to see if the 90th ball moves. (Yes, it does, easily.) Subsequent experiments increase the ball count eventually to 630 balls (114 feet), with the final ball still successfully moving. While the episode is clearly aimed at a young demographic, “Let’s Play Long Billiards” does a great job of revealing how the slightest imperfections (e.g., two balls not completely touching) can cause problems with accuracy and the transfer of forward momentum.

Outrageous Acts of Science

The final series is Outrageous Acts of Science, a Science Channel program in the US that features professional scientists, mathematicians and engineers reviewing and explaining internet videos of homemade science experiment and stunts, often accompanied by warnings of “don’t try this at home.” Now in its tenth season, the series first aired in April 2013.

In January 2015, the third season kicked off with the episode “Fact of Fake?” that includes a jaw-dropping billiards trick shot in which the cue ball, starting at the left back corner pocket makes a near-parabolic path around a straight line of approximately 40 balls bisecting the table to then pocket a ball in the right back corner pocket. The episode can be watched here.[1]

While the shot stuns some of the series’ experts, billiards enthusiasts will instantly identify the shot as real because the shot-maker is none other than Florian “Venom” Kohler, perhaps the world’s top trick shot artist and the (current) owner of six Guinness world records related to billiards.  As Venom modestly says, “Why would I fake it when I can do it?”

But, even if we know it’s real, we appreciate the explanations from the episode’s experts, physicists Helen Arney and Saad Sarwana, who contrast how “us mortals just hit a ball straight, giving the ball forward linear momentum…but, Florian is giving it linear momentum and [a lot of] angular momentum, where he strikes the ball off-center to make it spin very fast.”

So the next time you start tuning out when the conversation turns to science, just remember in billiards it’s all about the physics (and the math).

[1]      A huge thank you to my professional colleague, Metis Chief Data Scientist Deborah Berebichez, who is one of the experts on Outrageous Acts of Science, for informing me about this episode.

Supernatural – “The Gamblers”

Leave a reply

I’m frequently troubled by the lack of respect for billiards in pop culture.  I’m not talking about the cheap fascination with pool hustlers, the overuse of ridiculous trick shots, or the inevitable pool hall brawl.  All of these tropes reveal a certain lack of imagination or wanton trafficking in caricatures, but not inherently disrespect.  No, my lament has to do with the regular disregard for, and misrepresentation, of the rules of the game and the skill it involves, as if accuracy and verisimilitude have no role in a billiards movie or television episode.  The latest malefactor: “The Gamblers” episode of Supernatural.

Supernatural - "The Gamblers"Maybe if this were some third-rate, bargain basement series on late-night cable, I might be more forgiving.  But, Supernatural, a dark fantasy television series that launched in 2005, is now the longest-running American live-action fantasy TV series. Supernatural follows two brothers as they hunt demons, ghosts, monsters, and other supernatural beings. Currently airing its fifteenth and final season, the series averages more than one million weekly viewers; has spawned 17 novels, several comic book series, and multiple TV and anime spinoffs; and has received 45 awards and 151 nominations.  To put it bluntly, this is a show that can afford to get it right.

Supernatural - "The Gamblers"“The Gamblers” episode, which aired on January 30, 2020, finds Sam Winchester (Jared Padalecki) and his brother Dean (Jensen Ackles) at an Alaskan bar named Lurlene’s, where people bet their luck in games of pool.[1] As one cashier describes it, “If you win, you come back lucky. But, no one ever does…it’s a pool hall that makes you lucky or might kill you.” As it turns out, the pool hall is run by Atrox Fortuna, aka the Roman goddess of luck, who explains that her kind were created by God to take the blame from mankind when things go wrong, so this bar is her form of payback.

The plot didn’t make much sense to me, but it’s the billiards, not the storyline, which is my gripe.  Let’s start with the first match of 8-ball between Dean and Fortuna, who responds favorably to Dean’s cringe-inducing hustler strategy, “If the fish aren’t biting, throw them a little chum.” The match is hardly nail-biting, with Dean clearing the table quickly.  His game-winning 8-ball shot involves banking the cue off the rail to sink the eight in the corner pocket closest to him. And while he does sink the ball, it’s only after an uncalled double-kiss that by standard bar pool rules would constitute a foul and therefore a loss of game.[2] But, in “The Gamblers” there is no acknowledgement of this faux pas.  It’s as if the rules didn’t matter.

The second transgression is far more egregious. Dean, having decided that the brothers “have to minimize risk, maximize profit…it’s like a Fast Eddie…from Dad’s favorite…Paul Newman, The Hustler,” decides that he will play one more match to up his luck and sets out to find his “Jackie Gleason.”[3] A cowboy named Joey 6 agrees to play Dean.  As the game gets down to the final balls, it appears Joey 6 has immobilized Dean behind an opposing ball such that he can’t pocket the 8-ball.  Making it double-or-nothing, Dean beats Joey 6 by performing a jump shot to win the game.  EXCEPT, it’s an illegal scoop jump shot, a blatant billiards violation that is ignored by the players, actors, script-writers and director. It’s the equivalent of scoring a touchdown and disregarding the pass interference, or overlooking goaltending, or allowing a batted puck to count as goal.  The net effect of this blind eye to official rules is that Joey 6 runs out of luck and effectively dies from lung cancer.  Imagine if the rules had been followed.

There is an early moment in “The Gamblers” when Dean says to Sam, “Pool…the game of champions, kings, my game, hell, our game…how many great memories do we have hustling pool?”  That prompted me to search the Supernatural archives, and sure enough, this was the third episode to feature the brothers playing billiards.  The first was in Season 4 (“I Know What You Did Last Sumer”) and the more recent was in Season 10 (“Inside Man”).

Supernatural - "The Gamblers"And, lest you think “The Gamblers” was a fluke, this disregard for the actual rules of pool was on display in the earlier seasons, too.  In this clip from “Inside Man,” Dean is again in full-hustle mode, this time to teach a lesson to some overconfident college kids.  But, as he prepares the table for 8-ball, he racks the balls incorrectly, putting two stripes in the corners.

While I may not be the target demographic for this series, my review comes down to a few superlatives: Supernatural is super disappointing and super inauthentic.

[1]      Fun fact: Lurlene is derived from Lurlei, and altered to Lorelei. In Germanic legend, Lorelei was a beautiful siren who sat upon a rock in the Rhine River and lured sailors to shipwreck and death.

[2]      I understand if they are playing APA rules then Dean’s shot would be permitted.  But, who’s kidding who? This is Lulerne’s in Alaska, not the 8-Ball World Championship.

[3]      This horribly forced reference to The Hustler makes no sense, given Fast Eddie loses to Minnesota Fats (Jackie Gleason) in their initial matchup.

Love, American Style – “Love and the Hustler”

3 Replies

Since the Golden Age of Television in the 1950s, anthology series, which presents a different story and a different set of characters in each episode, segment and/or season, have been a mainstay. Wikipedia lists more than 200 such series. Some of these (e.g., Masterpiece Theater; Tales from the Crypt) have had a memorable impact on popular culture; most have not, disappearing after only a couple of seasons.

In my pursuit to discover every billiards television episode, it’s not surprising that I’ve uncovered more than a few episodes from anthology series. Those episodes have ranged from the spectacular (e.g., Twilight Zone – “Game of Pool”) to the craptacular (e.g., Friday the 13th – “Wedding Bell Blues”).

Love and the HustlerRecently, I learned of Love, American Style, a romantically-tinged comedy series that aired between 1969 and 1974.  Today, the series is probably best known for having a segment titled “Love and the Television Set” that ultimately led to the creation of the popular ABC show Happy Days.  But, for this reviewer, the only episode that matters is “Love and the Hustler,” which was the series premiere on September 29, 1969.

“Love and the Hustler,” which was one of three segments in the series premiere, focuses on Big Red (Flip Wilson), a boisterous yet charming pool player who is ultimately hustled by his romantic interest Mercy (Gail Fisher), a new player with more than beginner’s luck.

Love and the HustlerSpecifically, Big Red has been stakehorsed to play against a mystery opponent as part of a $500 wager.  While Big Red waits for his opponent, he entertains himself by showing off to Mercy, such as making the classic six ball “butterfly trick shot” in exchange for six kisses.  Big Red (and presumably, the viewers) believes the opponent is a no-show, but as is slowly revealed, his opponent is Mercy, who goes on to win fifty straight points.  Though he loses the match, he walks away with Mercy, still intent on claiming his six kisses.

From a technical billiards perspective, “Love and the Hustler” is pretty unimaginative. There are a couple of difficult shots shown from a birds-eye view, but most of the point-scoring is on fast cuts of easy shots and balls slamming into pockets.

However, from a cultural billiards perspective, there is more of interest.  Big Red does not lose to just any opponent. He loses to a woman – in fact, the reason the hustle works is because no one would suspect a woman of playing pool well.  Though there is little historical mention of female pool hustlers until Lori Shampo in the 1970s, “Love and the Hustler” aired in late 1969, right when the women’s liberation movement is emerging, so this idea would have had real cultural resonance.[1]

Love and the HustlerThe other aspect that is highly noteworthy is “Love and the Hustler” features an all-black cast.  Only a few years earlier, there were barely any shows on the air that could make this claim, aside from the immensely popular I Spy that ran from 1965-1968. But, with the Black Power (“Black is Beautiful”) movement impacting music, art, film, and dance, it of course started to permeate television, and by the “second half of the 1960s, there were more than two dozen programs featuring black actors as leading characters, or in prominent, regular supporting roles”…though many of those shows were quickly cancelled.[2]

I don’t know if Love, American Style regularly featured all-black casts.  But, “Love and the Hustler” certainly deserves honorable mention for launching the career of Flip Wilson (Big Red), who subsequently hosted his own weekly variety show, The Flip Wilson Show, which earned Wilson a Golden Globe and two Emmy Awards, and at one point was the second highest rated show on network television.

For Gail Fisher (Mercy), “Love and the Hustler” was another opportunity to increase her visibility. She was already on the path to breaking cultural milestones as the secretary Peggy Fair on the television detective series Mannix, a role for which she won two Golden Globes and an Emmy, thereby making her the first black woman to win either award.

“Love and the Hustler” is currently viewable on YouTube.

[1]      “Love and the Hustler” was not the first billiards episode to feature a female pool hustler.  That honor goes to the 1966 “Charley, the Pigeon” episode of My Three Sons.

[2]    “The Golden Age of Blacks in Television: The Late 1960s,” by J. Fred MacDonald

The Lucy Show – “Lucy and the Pool Hustler”

Leave a reply

December, 1967.  Jean Balukas, who would become known as one of the greatest billiards players in the world, was just eight year old.  “The Duchess of Doom” Allison Fisher was still in her mama’s belly. The Women’s Professional Billiards Association (WPBA) would not be conceived for another nine years. Similarly, the inaugural World Ladies Snooker Championship would also have to wait almost a decade.

Though billiards was not yet a women’s professional sport, and most of today’s female legends were too young to play or not yet born, the game’s demographics were changing. The late ‘60s were a period of cultural tumult and women’s liberation, and as billiards expanded beyond the pool parlors, more and more women started to pick up their cues.

This is the chronological backdrop for The Lucy Show episode “Lucy and the Pool Hustler” which aired in December 1967 as part of the series’ sixth season. The Lucy Show, starring Lucile Ball as Lucy Carmichael, was the follow-up to the immensely enjoyable sitcom I Love Lucy.

“Lucy and the Pool Hustler” acknowledges this gender shift right from the episode’s get-go. Harry Norton (Stanley Adams), a customer of the bank where Lucy works, is the proprietor of Norton’s Ball and Cue Salon. Formerly known as Norton’s Pool Room, with its “sexy calendars,” the rebranded salon has been cleaned up to entice women to frequent his establishment.  In fact, “since the dames took over, business has been terrific… [The women] aren’t here to play pool…now they play pocket billiards.” As for the red-felted tables?  “So what, now that I got green in the cash register,” exclaims Mr. Norton.

While Lucy learned how to play pool as a child, she’s not a fan of the game, until she learns that there is a Ladies Pocket Billiard Tournament, sponsored by the (fictitious) Pacific Billiard Supply Co., with a $1,000 cash first prize. Remarking that with $1000, she could “buy a new car, and a new color TV, and a new wardrobe, and redo [her] apartment…a $1000 makes a lot of down payments,” she enrolls in the tournament.

Lucy’s main competition is Laura Winthrop, who the audience knows is really the cigar-smoking, fast-talking, pool-hustling army veteran Ace Winthrop (Dick Shawn) in drag.  Behind in his payments to Mr. Norton, Ace agrees to enter the tournament, masquerading as a woman, as the fastest path to paying off his debt.

The little billiards that occurs in the episode is pretty uninspiring. Most of the comedy is devoted to lagging for the break, with Ace doing a behind-the-back lag matched by Lucy lagging with the bumper of her cue.  When Lucy makes even the most basic shot, the onlookers go wild, presumably awed by her ability to pocket any ball, which may be a cultural indicator that the mainstream still found it hard to believe a woman could shoot pool.

(Ironically, Lucille Ball was allegedly an avid pool player.  In 1972, she even loaned her name and image to a table top pool game by Milton Bradley called Pivot Pool, which was a tiny, plastic version of billiards for families.[1])

Winthrop, in turn, quickly starts running the table. When he’s one shot away from winning the purse, he concedes that Lucy is a “cute trick,” so he will at least make the match interesting by calling his final shot, “2-ball off the side cushion off the [second] side cushion off the front cushion off [another] side cushion into the side pocket.” His get-the-money/get-the-girl plan falls flat, however, when his wig gets stuck on some of the salon sculpture. With his dame-game scheme exposed, Lucy becomes the winner.

While Ms. Ball was a true pioneer in comedy, it’s hard to argue she did much to advance billiards for women in the “Lucy and the Pool Hustler” episode. Fortunately, help was around the corner, as women like Dorothy “Cool Hand” Wise and Palmer Byrd, put billiards on a national stage, and young prodigies, such as Jean Balukas, Allison Fisher and Loree Jon Hasson began showing the world that the “big lie about billiards being man’s game” was no more.[2]

[1]   Pivot Pool was one of five games in the 1970s that Lucille Ball released with Milton Bradley. The others were Pivot Golf, Solotaire, Cross Up, and Body Language.

[2]   Quote attributed to Dorothy Wise. (Source: “Cool Hand Dorothy is Women’s Champion,” Sarasota Herald-Tribune, 10/27/71.)

In a Man’s World – “Emily”

Leave a reply

At least since Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis disguised themselves as women to escape the police and mafia and join Sweet Sue and her all-female band the Society Syncopators in Some Like It Hot (1959), audiences have generally guffawed at men acting in drag. Tom Hanks jumpstarted his acting career by turning Kip into Buffy in Bosom Buddies. Dustin Hoffman got an Oscar nomination playing Dorothy Michaels in Tootsie. The Wayans brothers in White Chicks. Martin Lawrence in Big Momma’s House. Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire. The list goes on and on.

For women, the on-screen gender metamorphosis has not only been less common, but also is more often done for nobler purposes, specifically fighting societal stereotypes (e.g., Just One of the Guys; She’s the Man; Mulan; The Ballad of Little Jo).

With the new Bravo series In a Man’s World, executive producer (and Triple Crown of Acting winner) Viola Davis sought to dig deeper into the sexism women encounter every day by shifting the focus from fighting stereotypes to exposing the sexism head-on through real-life, temporary gender transformation. With this kind of social experiment, In a Man’s World can be seen as a cultural successor to John Howard Griffin’s autobiographical account Black Like Me, Norah Vincent’s memoir Self-Made Man, and even the reality franchise series Undercover Boss.

With four episodes having aired thus far, In a Man’s World documents the experiences of women who tackle gender issues and explore what it’s like to experience the world as a man. Aided by Oscar-winning makeup artist Dave Elsey and his wife Lou, vocal coach Tom Burke, and movement coach Esco Jouléy, the women ‘become’ men and interact in front of hidden cameras with the same people – specifically the same men – who have historically harassed them as women.

In a Man’s World premiered on October 1 this year with “Emily,” named after the episode’s protagonist, Emily “The Billiards Bombshell” Duddy.  Currently ranked #14 in the Women’s Professional Billiards Association, Ms. Duddy is no stranger to the pool-watching couch-potato crowd, as she was a cast member of the 2015 TruTV show The Hustlers.

Ms. Duddy is also a notable choice because, by her own admission, she has relied on her looks and femininity to stand out in a male-dominated business where she’s constantly subjected to demeaning comments that focus on her sex, not her ability.

It’s not a total surprise that the producers of In a Man’s World opted to make billiards the milieu for the inaugural episode.  Like many sports, competitive billiards operates with considerable pay inequality between genders. Top ranked men earn $84,222 compared to women who earn $15,600. But, even away from the tournaments, the palpable sexism that many women have encountered, or currently encounter, playing pool is both disgusting and debilitating.

Emily becomes Alex

The “Emily” episode crystalizes this point.  In a hidden-camera match against William “The Godfather” Finnegan at Amsterdam Billiards, she is verbally mocked and insulted 28 times, with comments such as “Gimme a good rack, like the rack you got” and “You’re in a man’s game in a man’s world.”  While some might argue this is the standard jeering and one-upmanship in a sport heavy on braggadocio, pomposity, and intimidation, it is glaringly telling that when Ms. Duddy returns in makeup and prosthetics as a “rugged, sexy cowboy” named Alex, s/he receives none of the same mockeries.

The emphasis on Mr. Finnegan as a Neanderthal nemesis, clinging to a chauvinistic era where it’s time for “women to go in the kitchen and cook [him] some food,” allows the episode to score easy points with its viewers. It’s impossible not to watch and sympathize with Ms. Duddy, her billiards buds Jennifer Barretta and Jackie, and the other estimated 8.8 million women who play pool.[1] On what planet is Mr. Finnegan’s pronouncement tolerable that in the pool games he organizes, “Only men can play. I don’t let women play. Don’t want ’em to play. They’re too slow. Most men don’t want to lose to the women. When I lost to a woman, I really don’t feel good. It’s the male ego: we feel that we’re more dominant.”?

But, ironically, Mr. Finnegan comes across as such a caricature that, as Andy Dehnart wrote in his review on Reality Blurred, “[Finnegan] becomes the problem: not institutionalized sexism in professional billiards, but one guy who acts like an ass.”

Furthermore, the physical, emotional and psychological changes that Ms. Duddy had to endure to transform from Emily to Alex are watered-down by the episode’s highly incredible ending. After losing a match to Mr. Finnegan, Ms. Duddy does her grand reveal and shows that Emily and Alex are the same person. Mr. Finnegan is awestruck! Amazed! Flabbergasted!

The Hustlers

Cast of The Hustlers, including Finnegan (3rd from left) and Duddy (6th from left).

Without the makeup and prosthetics, Mr. Finnegan too transforms, from a caveman to Mr. Woke Progressive. After watching the video footage, he proclaims, “She proved to us how we look at women, which now it shows to me that we’re wrong,” said Finnegan. “Women can compete in the man’s world of pool and now I understand. My tournaments that like I said I only invite men, as of today, will change.”

Maybe it’s all genuine.  Shit, I hope it is.  But, Mr. Finnegan is no stranger to television, having also acted with Ms. Duddy on The Hustlers.

Hashtag progress? Or hashtag realityTV?  Only time will tell.

[1] National Sporting Goods Association (2012).