The Comebacker: Tom Hanks to star in baseball movie directed by Marielle Heller

Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack, as Tom Hanks is heading back to the ballpark for The Comebacker, a new baseball project which has three studios scrambling to pick it up. I mean… I know I’ve got a dirty mind, but… that title.

The Comebacker

Marielle Heller, who directed Hanks in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, is set to helm The Comebacker, and also wrote the script based on a short story by Dave Eggers.

Hanks will play a “pitching coach of a major league hurler whose life is upended when he is hit in the head by a line drive on the mound. his life changes in all kinds of ways.” No word on who will play the pitcher and star alongside Hanks.

Production on the project will kick off in October, with the film to be produced by Hanks’ partner, Gary Goetzman, at Playtone, and by Heller’s producing partner, Leah Holzer, at Defiant By Nature. Of course, Hanks already has a classic baseball movie under his belt, as he starred alongside Geena Davis in A League of Their Own.

Greyhound 2

Hanks is currently wrapping up production on Greyhound 2. In addition to reprising his role as Captain Ernest Krause for the World War II movie, Hanks once again wrote the script, with Aaron Schneider returning to direct. Stephen Graham is also back as Charlie Cole.

The first film told a thrilling story inspired by actual events from the Battle of the Atlantic, based on The Good Shepherd by C.S. Forester. Ernest Krause is a first-time captain who leads a convoy of allied ships carrying thousands of soldiers across the treacherous waters of the “Black Pit” to the front lines of WWII. With no air cover protection for five days, Captain Krause and his convoy battled the surrounding enemy Nazi U-boats to give the Allies a chance to win the war.

The sequel finds Captain Krause and the Greyhound crew from the beaches of Normandy to the Pacific Ocean as they help turn the tide of the war.

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