Sydney Pollack's Hoosier Roots

It's not germane to anything having to do with South Florida, but since I'm probably one of the few people down here who's likely to connect-the-dots on this point for ya, I thought I'd share this with you.
Hollywood film director and sometime actor Sydney Pollack went to South Bend's Central High School, the real-life "big" school opponent that Gene Hackman's "Hickory" team had to play at the climactic end of Hoosiers, based on Milan High's famous David-over-Goliath upset of them in 1954.
As I note near the top of my blog South Beach Hoosier, since the day I started it, at the end of
Dave's Intentions for South Beach Hoosier:

"And David put his hand in the bag and took out a stone and slung it. And it struck the Philistine on the head and he fell to the ground. Amen."
-Preacher Purl encouraging the Hickory basketball team before the title game against South Bend Central in Hoosiers, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091217/


Late tonight, at 3 a.m., TCM is airing one of my favorite films of his, 1975's Three Days of the Condor http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=4274
"A CIA researcher uncovers top secret information and finds himself marked for death," with Robert Redford, Faye Dunaway and Cliff Robertson.


Please also see John Young's remembrance of Pollack at Variety:
Sydney Pollack dies at 73, Multihyphenate won Oscar for 'Out of Africa'
http://www.variety.com/VR1117986467.html and Variety's video retrospective at: http://www.variety.com/index.asp?layout=videoBC&bcpid=713438541&bclid=713073358&bctid=1576205579


excerpt from South Bend Star-Tribune http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080526/Ent/16035212/1038/Ent


Renowned director Pollack dies at 73, Hollywood icon grew up in South Bend, graduated from Central High School.


"...Pollack graduated from South Bend Central High School, where he developed a love of drama. Throughout his long career, he credited his director at Central High, the late James Lewis Casaday, for making an artistic life beyond his blue-collar town seem possible.


Instead of going to college, Pollack moved to New York and enrolled at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theater. He studied there for two years under Sanford Meisner, who was in charge of its acting department, and remained for five more as Meisner’s assistant. He also served 21 months in the U.S. Army.


After appearing in a handful of Broadway productions in the 1950s, Pollack turned his eye to directing. Before settling into the film industry, Pollack directed television series, including “Ben Casey” and “The Fugitive.”


Although Pollack has no relatives still living in South Bend, he occasionally visited the area.
“I didn’t dislike South Bend,” Pollack said in a 2002 Tribune interview. “I understand that it’s gotten much more culturally oriented. At the time I was there, there was really nothing outside of what Mr. Casaday did. “I want people to see things the way I did when I was a kid growing up watching movies,” Pollack said just prior to a 1977 trip to South Bend. Pollack was the guest of honor at the Indiana premier of his film “Bobby Deerfield” as part of the 1977 grand opening festivities for Century Center..."