Earlier today, the Playlist dug through Fanhouse’s on-set report from Moneyball — the long in gestation adaptation of Michael Lewis’s book on Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane and the development of sabermetrics — and found this amusing tidbit: Paul DePodesta, the former A’s assistant GM being played by Jonah Hill, has successfully petitioned the producers to not use his name (they’re going with the much lamer “Peter Brand†for Hill’s character now). Why? Writes Fanhouse:
Meaning no offense to Hill, [DePodesta] simply felt that the character was fictitious, and only loosely based on him. “At the end of the day, I just wasn’t comfortable with my name on a fictitious character,†DePodesta wrote in an email.
Huh. Interesting. Was DePodesta previously unaware of how movie adaptations work? Did he have any issues when Demetri Martin was set to play him? And could this, perhaps, just maybe, have something to do with Jonah Hill and Paul DePodesta looking nothing alike? More specifically: Could it have something to do with DePodesta being a fit, former two-sport athlete at Harvard and Hill, well, not? By the way, you know who’s totally cool with his name on a fictitious character? Billy Beane. He got Brad Pitt, though.
Oakland Goes Hollywood With Brad Pitt’s ‘Moneyball’ Production [Fanhouse via Playlist]