Award-winning filmmaker Aviva Kempner tells the real story of Moe Berg, major league baseball player turned spy. 

In this first ever feature-length documentary about the enigmatic Berg, Kempner again focuses her camera on a little-known Jewish hero. From the streets of Newark to five major league teams during baseball’s Golden Age to his secret life spying for the OSS during WWII…Berg’s improbable story is told with rare historical footage and revealing interviews with family and an All-Star roster from the worlds of history, sports and spy craft.

 

“There’s much to absorb throughout THE SPY BEHIND HOME PLATE … Kempner’s passion for her remarkable subject is always evident. If she wants you to know a lot about Moe Berg, that’s because there’s a lot worth knowing.”

– Ken Jaworowski, The New York Times

“The question The Spy Behind Home Plate poses is which is more amazing: the astonishing man whose story it tells, or the brilliance of the film itself. This is one of the best films of the year and one of the great documentaries of recent years.”

– Jeffrey Lyons, Lyons Den Radio

“The Spy Behind Home Plate is a triumph, a dazzling mosaic of stills and footage and talking heads who knew Moe Berg or wish they had. If there were a trophy for The Most Interesting Man in Baseball, Berg would have retired it for all time.”

– John Thorn, MLB official historian

 

“AN INCREDIBLE STORY.” “A HOME RUN!”

– Danielle Solzman, Solzy at the Movies

 

“Kempner hits it out of the park”

– David Kempler, Big Picture Big Sound

 

“Seeing the story played out with reams of interviews and archival footage is so much better. It makes the unbelievable believable.”

– Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor

 

“It’s a respectable ode to Berg’s unusual, remarkable life.”

– William Bibbiani, The Wrap

 

“Fascinating, incredible and rather mind blowing”

– Michael S. Goldberger, Williston Observer

From the Blog

The Spy Behind Home Plate is a documentary about Moe Berg, an enigmatic Jewish catcher during baseball’s Golden Age who joined the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to spy for the U.S. on the Nazis’ atomic bomb program.

Office of Strategic Services established

On June 13, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). Throughout the Second World War, this wartime intelligence agency operated in every theater (albeit minimally in the Pacific), collecting and analyzing information as...

Film Threat Review of “The Spy Behind Home Plate”

Most people are nesters. They wiggle and squirm through life until they find a nice warm spot to burrow their heads in. For work, it’s as simple as finding something reliable that doesn’t make you completely miserable—a little misery is expected. Moe Berg wasn’t most...

2022 Early Baseball Era Committee Candidate: Lefty O’Doul

While traveling to Japan with a group of All-Stars in 1931, he became engrossed with spreading the game, soon writing a manual for teaching the fundamentals of baseball to Japanese players, and serving as a goodwill ambassador both before and after World War II in...

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