Neal McDonough Reflects on ‘Angels in the Outfield’ and Why It Was So Personal (Exclusive)
Neal McDonough‘s career has taken him everywhere from the fields of warn-torn Europe in Band of Brothers to the Midwest underworld in Tulsa King, which just launched its third season this September. But it’s easy to forget that McDonough’s career began in earnest with an outstanding turn in the 1994 Disney classic Angels in the Outfield, which featured Danny Glover, Tony Danza, and Christopher Lloyd in starring roles; McDonough appeared alongside other future stars including Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Matthew McConaughey. For McDonough, the role was more than a career breakthrough; as he told Remind, the film had a very personal meaning for him — not just because he had been a college baseball player himself, but because his role helped him honor his then-recently-passed mother.
“I could have retired after that film,” said McDonough. “I had so much fun. My mom had just passed away, and I hadn’t been in a feature film yet, and when she passed away, a friend of mine said they were auditioning for a remake of Angels in the Outfield. And I was a college baseball player, so I knew I had a great shot at it. I met the director, and I got the part, and came up with all these great ideas, and then I dyed my hair red, as my mom had flaming red hair, and I made him as goofy as possible. And there was this lack of fear that I had after my mom died. ‘OK, my touchstone is gone. I’m going to just start not worrying so much about what other people think of me. I’m going to just be a great actor.’ And from that moment on, everything kind of just shifted.”
Why Whitt Bass was personal for Neal McDonough
That feeling of fearlessness helped him turn what was supposed to be a tiny role into a standout performance.
“The first day, it said in the script ‘Whitt Bass throws pitch,'” he recalled. “That’s all it said from my character in the movie. And I told the director there — we were shooting in Oakland Municipal stadium, and there’s 10, 15,000 fans, and everyone’s there …. And he says, ‘Neal, go out for your pitch.’ I’m like, ‘I have an idea.’ He said, ‘What do you have in mind?’ And I practiced. I mean, in my hotel room, I practiced for weeks, as to how I was going to be a character that popped off the screen. So, ‘Can you follow me? I’m going to do something. I’m going to come in from the first baseline, I’m going to come into the mound. I’m going to do something.’ … And [director] Bill Dear just stares at me like, ‘Okay, okay, guys, you have one take me up, because I don’t have time. This is a big movie.’… I’m like, ‘No, all I need is one take.’
“‘OK, boys follow Neal,’ and there I am. I run in. I slide into the mound. I circle, circle, circle. I grab the rosin bag. Do the thing, bless myself, toss on it. 10,000 fans go bonkers, laughing their faces off. And after that, Bill Dear is like, ‘You can do anything you want for the rest of the film.'”
How his mom inspired his career-making performance
The confidence McDonough felt while creating the wacky character of Whitt Bass, he said, came from his mother. “I know when my mom passed away, that she just said, she infused it into me, the spirit of my mom. And then, a few years later, when I met my wife, Ruvé, it was that same kind of feeling that you can do anything you want, just believe in it. And I’ve been blessed to have two amazing women in my career that made me realize God gave me a talent, don’t let him down, and be as entertaining as possible.”
Despite the long and acclaimed career he’s developed since, McDonough will always have a soft spot for his first film: “To have the 30th anniversary of Angels in the Outfieldis to me … It’s just like…Danny Glover, Matthew McConaughey, Adrian Brody, myself, Christopher Lloyd, Tony Danza! And I got to play baseball for three months. It was, it was the greatest gig I ever had. It was so much fun.”
Additional reporting by Amanda Bell