Wayne Hickey II, portraying an umpire, waits out a rainstorm during filming of the movie “42” at Engel Stadium.In 2012, advocates of the silver screen made serious headway putting Chattanooga on filmmakers’ maps, and for 2013, that trend seems set to continue.
Arguably the biggest cinematic story of 2012 was that Engel Stadium served as a major filming location for “42,” a biopic of racial-barrier-destroying baseball legend Jackie Robinson.
On April 21, filmmakers descended for a shooting session that lasted about two months. During that time, Engel Stadium, the former home of the Chattanooga Lookouts, was redecorated to serve as a stand-in for Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Hundreds of locals answered a casting call for extras and donned ’40s duds to help fill the seats. The movie, which will premiere on April 12, stars Chadwick Boseman as Robinson and Harrison Ford as Brooklyn Dodgers team executive Branch Rickey.
Later in the summer, helicopters circled the Market Street Bridge to film a scene that was shown briefly in “Identity Thief,” a comedy that premiered Feb. 8 and starred Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy.