The Prime Video series features several major nods and Easter eggs to Penny Marshall's classic film about women’s baseball.
Now streaming on Prime Video, A League of Their Own is the TV series adapted from Penny Marshall’s classic 1992 film about the formation of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) in the 1940s.
Co-created by Will Graham and Abbi Jacobson, who also stars as catcher Carson Shaw, the series widens the lens to explore the authentic and diverse lives of the league's many players, with season 1 largely focused on the women that made up the Rockford Peaches. But it also feels very familiar, capturing the essence of what made the movie, which recently celebrated its 30th anniversary, such a long standing favorite.
In fact, there are several references, homages and Easter eggs or what D’Arcy Carden, who plays Peaches player Greta, calls “little kisses to the movie” that many fans will instantly recognize. While speaking with ET, the ensemble cast breaks down what it was like to be part of some of the bigger, more notable moments, from the tryouts montage to reciting Tom Hanks’ classic line, “There’s no crying in baseball.”
“We intentionally kind of created the Easter eggs within the show, hopefully as a language to say to viewers, like, ‘We love this movie,’” Graham says.
[Warning: Some spoilers for season 1 of A League of Their Own]
The key characters
Among the series’ many characters, there are a few that share obvious parallels with ones in Marshall’s film. Jacobson plays Carson, a star catcher whose husband is fighting in the war and takes an unofficial leadership position on the team not unlike Geena Davis' Dottie. Like Hanks’ Jimmy, Nick Offerman plays a washed up baseball player named Casey, who has been tasked with managing the Peaches.
Elsewhere, Greta and Jo (Melanie Field) bear similar resemblance to Mae (Madonna) and Doris (Rosie O’Donnell), respectively, with the pair recreating their film counterparts’ close dynamic. And even O’Donnell, who guest stars on the series as a new character named Vi, clocked the two while on set.
“I remember she walked in the room and she was like, ‘Oh, it’s the me to me.’ And I was like, ‘This is the greatest compliment I’ve ever received in my life,’” Field shares. “It felt a lot to have her stamp of approval on it because she was such an iconic figure from the movie.”
“It was the best, like, the funniest, most Rosie thing,” Carden says, while stressing the fact that “we weren’t trying to play them” and that “the pairing of the two is a little kiss to the movie.” And when it comes to any of the roles’ similarities to their film counterparts, it’s just a jumping off point. “I just love that all these characters become themselves, their own thing,” the actress adds.
The tryouts montage
“From the opening frames of the show, you meet Abbi’s character Carson as she’s running for a train, which is what Dottie and Kit do,” Graham says, referring to Davis and Lori Petty’s characters.
After chasing down the train that will take her into Chicago, Carson -- along with other hopefuls Greta and Jo -- eventually find their way to the stadium early in the first episode. Not long after the three women take the field, the series shows a montage of the tryouts that’s shot in similar fashion to the movie’s famous moment when Dottie, Kit and others auditioned for spots in the league. (Both scenes are even set to the same music, “Sing! Sing! Sing!” by Gene Krupa.)
“When we walk through the tunnel onto the field, that’s almost shot for shot, I think, of what the movie is,” Carden says, before revealing “that was such a surreal moment” to film. “It was sort of like the moment was tumbling in on itself.”
“It was us three, as actors who got this great job and this is our favorite movie, and now we’re playing this and we just walked through the tunnel to get to the field,” she recalls. “Like, the whole thing was very meta. We were like, ‘Is this about Greta and Carson and Jo? Or, is it about Abbi and Darcy and Mel?’ ‘Cause it was like, ‘Holy sh*t, here we are.’”
“There’s no crying in baseball”
In the film, Hanks says the iconic line when Evelyn (Bitty Schram) starts crying on the field after a bad play, launching endless memes and countless imitations.
But in the series, the moment comes halfway through the season, during episode five, “Back Footed,” when it’s Carson who succumbs to her emotions and starts crying before the start of a game. That’s when teammate Jess (Kelly McCormack) yells at her, exclaiming “There’s no crying in baseball!” before walking away in a fury.
“I was thrilled when I read it on the page and absolutely terrified and angry to do it,” McCormack recalls with a laugh. “I was like, ‘I feel like the worst actor in the world right now, because there’s no way I can think of this as a line, you know?’ You have to be a good actor [and] forget that you’re saying lines. But I was like, Well, this is it. I’m just gonna say this line and then go on with my day.’”
Despite any hesitation about having to perform those famous words, McCormack says, “It was a huge honor but also absolutely terrifying and I hope it was OK.”
Dottie’s bare-handed catch and the Black fan returning the ball
As Max, Chanté Adams gets to recreate a couple of iconic ball moments from the film, from Dottie’s bare-handed catch during tryouts to Kit’s lob in the barn to convince the scout she should audition for the league, as well as nods to the moment when a Black female fan returns a stray ball.
In the film, Dottie famously catches a fast ball without her glove, proving to the other girls she’s a formidable player -- and not just some other farm girl hoping for a chance to get out of town. And in the series, Max is tested in the same way during episode seven, “Full Count,” when she has the chance to step in as pitcher for the Black baseball team playing a game outside the local factory.
“Max one-hand catches the ball. Yup, we’ve got that Easter egg in there,” Adams quips.
Earlier in the episode, Max throws a pitch inside the factory to prove to her newfound friend, Esther (Andia Winslow), that she can play ball. It’s the second time she has to show off her throwing skills in the series, with the first time being in the premiere.
During tryouts, Max throws the ball up into the stands and impresses everyone around her. That moment, in particular, Adams says is a reference to the brief scene when a Black female fan (DeLisa Chinn-Tyler) throws the ball over Dottie to Peaches pitcher Ellen Sue (Freddie Simpson).
“The first shot when you see my character is when she picks up the ball… we’re continuing the story of in the movie when we saw the Black woman get the ball and throw it back,” Adams explains, before adding, “That’s, like, our iconic Easter egg scene.”
For Carden, “when Chanté as Max, when she picks up that ball and throws it,” it’s just one of many “moments from the movie that we get to expand on that are super surreal,” she says.
The “Victory Song” performance
In the film, it’s Evelyn who “writes” the AAGPBL theme song commonly known as the “Victory Song.” In real life, it was Nalda “Birdie” Phillips and Lavonne “Pepper” Paire Davis who penned the classic ditty that was heard first in the locker room and then later, toward the end, during the unveiling of the AAGPBL exhibit at the Baseball Hall of Fame.
In the show, it’s not until the season 1 finale, “Perfect Game,” that the Peaches finally perform the song. It happens as the women gather on the front porch of their home before their final game of the season. Before they head out, Esti (Priscilla Delgado) insists that they sing “Victory Song” and the whole team eventually joins in.
“I really like the way they did that with Priscilla’s character wanting us to sing the song and everyone’s kinda like, ‘OK, we’ll do it for you.’ I don’t know, I just thought that was like a really great way to do it,” Carden says.
Charm school and more
Other nods to the movie include a brief charm school scene, during which the players find themselves subject to some unwanted primping and preening; Carson pulling stunts while catching a fly ball; the women getting harassed by male fans who claim they can’t play baseball; as well as Carson and Lupe (Roberta Colindrez) both giving their teammates signals from the dugout.
While Jacobson jokes that there are several “deep-down eggs” hidden in the series, Colindrez and McCormack tease that “there are a lot of shot-for-shot [moments]” that fans will enjoy. It is just a matter of spotting them all.
A League of Their Own is now streaming on Prime Video.
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