36 June 13 • 2019
jn
MICHAEL FOX SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS
A
Major League baseball player during the
1920s and ’
30s, Moe Berg had a 15-year
sports career that was unremarkable. It was
what he did off the field that made him a true hero.
Berg, a brilliant professional athlete who spoke
seven languages, led a secret second life as a spy for
the U.S. government.
Former Detroiter Aviva Kempner, who hit a home
run with her 1998 documentary about another
Jewish ballplayer in The Life and Times of Hank
Greenberg, was the natural filmmaker to take on the
mysteries at the heart of Berg’
s minor celebrity.
The Spy Behind Home Plate is a testament to
Kempner’
s determination and persistence. Chock full
of dozens of contemporary and archival interviews
and packed with rare photos and even rarer film foot-
age, The Spy Behind Home Plate is a definitive record
of Berg’
s achievements. Although it’
s an effective way
to impart information, the talking heads, vintage visu-
als and period music can’
t fully evoke the shadowy
stealth and deadly risks of Berg’
s wartime activities.
The documentary runs June 21-28 at the Maple
Theater in Bloomfield Township with a special pre-
view screening at 7 p.m. Thursday, June 20, at the
theater that features an introduction by local baseball
historian Dr. Robert “Bob” Matthews (see sidebar)
and a Q&A session with Kempner (see sidebar). The
preview is hosted by Detroit’
s Jewish Community
Center and Jewish Federation. Seating is limited;
tickets can be purchased online or at the Maple
Theater box office.
Kempner’
s award-winning career is defined by
portraits of forgotten or overlooked Jewish heroes.
Greenberg and Berg are part of a gallery that
includes Kempner’
s 1986 debut, Partisans of Vilna,
Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg (about the pioneering televi-
sion writer, actress and producer Gertrude Berg) and
Rosenwald, which recounts Sears exec and philan-
thropist Julius Rosenwald’
s contributions to African
American education.
BERG’
S MYSTERIOUS LIFE
Morris Berg, international man of mystery, was born
in New York in 1902. His father had fled a Ukrainian
shtetl for the Lower East Side, where he started a
laundry before buying a pharmacy and drugstore in
Newark.
The family moved to New Jersey when Moe was
a boy, and he grew into an excellent student and a
terrific baseball player. After a year at NYU, he trans-
ferred to Princeton, where he was a star shortstop
(back when the Ivy League was the top, if not only,
sports conference) and graduated Phi Beta Kappa.
fi
lm
arts&life
The Spy Behind
Home Plate
Former Detroit fi
lmmaker Aviva
Kempner tells the real story of Moe
Berg, a Major-Leaguer turned spy.
TOP: Moe Berg’
s passport. ABOVE: Moe Berg in a military jeep in
California with his brother Sam during the war, July 1942.
COURTESY OF IRWIN BERG
PUBLIC DOMAIN
A
lthough born in Berlin, director-writ-
er-producer Aviva Kempner has strong
ties to Detroit.
Her parents, Harold Kempner and Helen Ciesla,
met and fell in love in Berlin. Her mother was
a Holocaust survivor from Poland, with blond
hair, green eyes and false papers, who passed as a
Polish Catholic in Germany. Her father was a U.S.
Army officer who wrote a story about Helen and
her brother surviving the war.
In 1950, they moved to Detroit where an uncle
lived. Her parents divorced when she was 13, and
her mother married Wayne State University histo-
ry professor Milton Covensky.
“My father gave me a strong sense
of Jewish identity and love of baseball, especial-
ly for Hank Greenberg,” she said. “My brother
Jonathan and I heard about him every Yom
Kippur, so we always thought Hank was part
of Kol Nidre services.”
Kempner grew up in Detroit, attending Cass
Tech High School in the mid-’
60s. She received
an undergraduate degree in psychology and a
master’
s in urban planning from the University of
Michigan.
“While receiving my masters, I sold movie the-
ater tickets at the Michigan Theater, so maybe
that was my first experience in the business,” she
jokes. “My years on the Michigan Daily devel-
oped my passion for the news and telling a good
story.” She also earned a law degree at Antioch
School of Law in Washington, D.C., where she
now lives.
Aviva Kempner
Can’
t take Detroit out
of this girl.
KERI GUTEN COHEN STORY DEVELOPMENT EDITOR
continued on page 38
continued on page 38