Small Screen Scenes: GLICKMAN, ILLUMINATING THE LIFE AND LEGACY OF THE MAN WHO PIONEERED MODERN SPORTS REPORTING, DEBUTS AUGUST 26, 2013 EXCLUSIVELY ON HBO & HIGHLY RECOMMENDED BY WHOM YOU KNOW Our Coverage Sponsored by ECO SWIM BY AQUA GREEN
GLICKMAN: Marty Glickman
Photo Credit: Courtesy HBO
ECO SWIM BY AQUA GREEN is a sustainable-minded collection of eco bathingsuits that is committed to making a difference through fashion. ECO SWIM BY AQUA GREEN's focus is to promote ocean awareness and responsibility for our planet while providing an alternative that compliments a discerning mindset for leadership in style and fashion.
ECO SWIM AQUA GREEN swimwear is made in America with every effort to reduce your carbon footprint in the sand™. ECO SWIM BY AQUA GREEN is about feeling good about your purchases and conscious actions today that create a better world for tomorrow.
***
“GLICKMAN captures the nobility and excitement of Marty himself:
Inventive, accessible and veracious. A New York staple who ignited sports and
taught America the only way to experience the games.”
– Martin Scorsese
GLICKMAN: Marty Glickman
Photo Credit: Courtesy HBO
SWISH! Ever heard that during a basketball game? That term was coined by Marty Glickman.
The HBO Documentary hit parade continues today with Glickman, Executive Producer Martin Scorsese! If you like sports you will love it. If you are Jewish you will love it. If you appreciate personality in journalism you will love it, and if you don't we're not sure why you're reading us! Marty Glickman we believe we first learned about in our History of Sports class by Professor Andrew Buni at Boston College-see guess who's Catholic and loved it- and we are pleased to continue building knowledge of this illustrious person through the magic only found at HBO. We were thrilled to see the late Wellington Mara included in this (he was honored and spoke one year at a BC dinner we attended) and many Maras are also BC graduates including owner of the NY Giants John-also included in this documentary.
A Brooklyn native and a graduate of Syracuse University, Marty Glickman proved to be larger than life from the start though through his actions we see that he always was down-to-earth and cared about everyone. He was one of the members of the US Olympic team traveling to Berlin in 1936 only to find at the last minute that both he and one teammate would not be participating in the relay, as planned. This would not be the first time he'd face adversity and prejudice in his life and his attitude was always one to make the most of opportunities and move forward.
"Good afternoon everyone!" marked his college radio debut, though it was at night. We can understand how being on college radio could be nerve wracking! (Peachy was on Poc Off for University College Cork in Ireland-as was Des Curran who is now on ESPN- and was a guest often on Tyler and Mook's Boston College hockey show giving color commentary.) After Syracuse, Glickman went on to WHN radio with a 15 minute late night show and one year in a steady salary. However, anyone in this field knows nothing is stable and he lost his job two weeks before his wedding, so took a day job at Gimbel's and at nights worked at no pay at the radio station and married his high school sweetheart on Christmas day 1940. No one said it was going to be easy...
Persistence paid off and soon on the weekends, Glickman was broadcasting minor league football games for $50/game. Later he would be the first person on the air for HBO!
We are pleased to say that Marty Glickman was a proud patriot. How many sportscasters today would join the Marines? That's precisely what Glickman did in 1943: he enlisted in the Marines and was stationed in the Marshall Islands in the Central Pacific. We applaud this patriotism and believes it sets him apart as well.
Larry King said of Glickman that he invented the way basketball should be broadcast. Many today may take every aspect of sports information feeding into the internet and television for granted, but once radio was the only available medium to follow a game. Even Ronald Reagan was once a sportscaster, and we found that out in his amazing autobiography. If you can take yourself back to this time, imagine how words alone painted pictures of glory in the minds of the listeners. Glickman was one to broadcast games the way he saw them, literally, enlivening the imaginations of listeners everywhere to their delight. When your writing teacher tells you in school to show not tell, that is precisely what Glickman did.
If you were around for the golden age of New York Giants football in the 1960's, we understand now that Glickman was instrumental in that era too. Frank Gifford is included in this triumphant documentary as well. Jets fans do not fret as he went to your side later when WNEW did not have the good sense to renew his contract.
Beyond sports, Glickman was in a class by himself and showed he had class by looking beyond sports to accentuate other aspects of life in his high school sports coverage. In his broadcasts, Glickman included the chess club, the debate club, the cheerleaders and united people though he once was the victim of division. Glickman understood that sports can be a vehicle of positivity in life. Remember what we said about his laudable attitude? He also had to put up with damage to his career by the gambling of others...
We know the joys of the simplicity of radio by listening to Rita Cosby every day and are reminded of its value today by where it has been thanks to the genius of Marty Glickman and HBO documentaries. HBO celebrates the progress of women we know from Marion Dougherty in Casting By and we were happy to see they included the 12/27/87 broadcast of Glickman with the first woman to do play-by-play football, Gayle Sierens. The prejudice against women in broadcasting we would think is the greatest, particularly when the topic is sports or any other male-dominated field...let the glass ceiling be broken forever.
Above all this, Glickman was a great teacher and those that he helped rise are included in this documentary giving credit where credit is due. This may be the greatest testament to his success: his legacy. He reveled in the success of others.
GLICKMAN: Marty Glickman
Photo Credit: Courtesy HBO
Though we've shown you why you should see this, be aware the details revealed in the documentary are even more intriguing...
WHOM YOU KNOW HIGHLY RECOMMENDS GLICKMAN!
IT HAS MADE BIG SWISH ON US.
GLICKMAN: James L. Freedman
Photo Credit: Courtesy of HBO
***
Before Marv Albert and Bob Costas, there was Marty Glickman. A gifted Jewish-American athlete who was denied the chance to represent the U.S. at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, he went on to become one of the most revered and influential sportscasters in history, pioneering many of the techniques, phrases and programming innovations that are commonplace in sports reporting today. Chronicling his remarkable life and career, GLICKMAN debuts MONDAY, AUG. 26 (9:00-10:30 p.m. ET/PT), exclusively on HBO.
Other HBO playdates: Aug. 26 (3:50 a.m.) and 29 (4:30 p.m., 12:10 a.m.), and Sept. 1 (11:15 a.m.), 4 (noon), 9 (8:00 a.m., 5:15 a.m.) and 14 (4:30 p.m.)
HBO2 playdates: Aug. 28 (8:00 p.m.) and Sept. 7 (2:45 p.m.), 12 (9:35 a.m.), 17 (12:45 a.m.) and 23 (12:50 p.m.)
GLICKMAN is the first documentary from writer, producer and director James L. Freedman, who produced Glickman’s late-night sports program on New York radio as a high-school senior. Featuring archival footage and interviews with such notables as Marv Albert, Bob Costas, Bill Bradley, Jim Brown, Frank Gifford, Larry King, Jerry Stiller, New York Giants co-owner John Mara and others, the film tells the story of a man who overcame prejudice to forge a remarkable career, setting the gold standard for sports broadcasters past, present and future.
Born in the Bronx in 1917, Martin “Marty” Glickman was dubbed “the Flatbush Flash” as a teen. He became a national sprint champion and star of his undefeated high-school football team before attending Syracuse University, where he continued to excel in football and track. After beating Ben Johnson, the world record-holder in the 60-yard dash, Glickman decided to try out for the 1936 U.S. Olympic track team. At the trials, Glickman was announced as having finished third in the 100-meter race, although the officials, who were likely biased, dropped him to fifth place. Still, he made the team as part of the 400-meter relay, joining Jesse Owens and others bound for Berlin.
With Adolf Hitler in the stands, Owens won three gold medals, shattering the illusion of Nazi supremacy. Avery Brundage, chairman of the U.S. Olympic Committee, along with assistant coach Dean Cromwell, then declared that Owens and Ralph Metcalfe would replace Glickman and Sam Stoller – the only Jews – on the relay team, ostensibly because “secret” German runners were expected to challenge for the gold. The U.S. team won by 15 yards, while the Germans finished a distant fourth.
Glickman returned to the States to star on the Syracuse football team. Offered a nighttime radio show for $15 a broadcast, he developed a niche in sports broadcasting. Following graduation, he moved back to New York, married his high-school sweetheart, Marge, and made a name for himself doing dramatic recreations of baseball games. In 1943, he enlisted in the Marines and served in the Marshall Islands.
After the war, Glickman recognized a broadcasting opportunity in basketball, which was only a fringe sport at the time. His staccato calls and innovative verbiage such as “swish” and “good like Nedick’s” changed the way sports were called. Giving the listener the geography of the court, his style was what Larry King described as “television on radio.” Still, when the NBA signed a contract with a TV network, Glickman was replaced by “more Midwestern” voices.
Glickman kept working, broadcasting New York Knicks games and narrating Paramount newsreels, which included calling sports as disparate as soapbox derbies and curling. He endeared himself to New Yorkers as the voice of Giants football during their “golden age” of the ‘50s and ‘60s until he was lured to the Jets in 1972.
Around this time he joined HBO, then a fledging cable network. Glickman was the first person to be heard on air on HBO, helping launch the burgeoning network’s sports division with innovations such as early-round coverage of Wimbledon tennis. NBC hired him to coach network announcers, including Gayle Sierens, who remains the only woman in history to call an NFL game.
Briefly retiring in the mid-‘80s, he returned to work Jets games for five more years before retiring for good in 1992. Glickman died Jan. 3, 2001 at age 83. A gifted athlete and unparalleled broadcaster, he devoted his life to helping kids, as well as working with New York City high schools and the Police Athletic League, among others. Marty Glickman was a lifelong advocate of sports as a means of transcending divisions created by race, class and religion.
For more information, visit: Facebook: facebook.com/hbodocs; and Twitter: @HBODocs and @GlickmanTheFilm.
GLICKMAN was written, produced and directed by James L. Freedman; executive producer, Martin Scorsese; executive producers, Emma Tillinger Koskoff, Rick Yorn; narrated by James L. Freedman; music by David Carbonara.
