Shooting Pool

Epigram: Gwendolyn Brooks's great poem "The Pool Players"

With the Oscars fast approaching, this seems the right time for another hero appreciation post. The Academy is sure to genuflect at the altar of Paul Newman this Sunday; nothing wrong with that. He deserved it more than most. But I'd like to take an alternate approach to the months-late eulogy. This post is about what Paul Newman taught me about shooting pool, and about life.

I had always played pool when I could growing up, but I got really interested in being good at it because of Paul Newman. I was an impressionable kid early on in high school when I saw The Hustler, and all I can think now is thank god that movie is about pool, because if Newman had played a junkie, I might have tried my hand at that instead.

Before and after Marlon Brando and James Dean there was Paul Newman. There will always be Paul Newman. The guy was just plain cool; good looking in a way that didn't try to be; killer smile, eyes like a husky. He also happened to be a great actor, a generous soul, and a classy human being. I wanted to shoot pool like him, be laid back like him, be funny like him.

In the late '70s and early '80s, Newman, with his wife and kids, used to vacation at a modest, unassuming place on one of the Lake Champlain islands, where no one made a fuss about who guests were or what they did. I know this because as it happened, that was the same place my family often stayed. No, there's no brush with fame story here. Our visits always seemed to just miss overlapping, but it was good enough even to share the same general space he had.

Movie-wise, The Sting might have been my first Newman, followed by Butch Cassidy ("Who are those guys?"), Exodus, Cool Hand Luke, Slapshot, and then The Hustler. Of all his movies, I own only The Hustler. I have seen it countless times. But that first time I saw it was special. My family had just bought a pool table to put in our basement, and I was playing a lot. I fell in love with the film instantly, and fell further in love with pool. I started shooting straight pool and badgering my younger brother into playing games up to increasingly high numbers. I couldn't run rack after rack, like Newman and Jackie Gleason, but I had my runs.

I practiced. I had a few trick shots, but more often than not, I worked on the break, on caroms, on english, on leaves. I learned. I learned it's not easy to be great. It takes a lot of work.

I played even more in college. It was something I was good at at a time when I found it important to be good at something. To show off occasionally, to feel good about myself, to drink beer, to let off steam.

There were a few tables scattered around campus, but usually, I'd play at the local bars. As a sophomore, my friend Billy and I would head into town around 5:00 nearly every Friday to get in some early games before the night began in earnest. There was a dive called the Turf Bar that had two tables and a jukebox with "Mac the Knife" on it, and a guy — Walt, I think his name was — behind the bar who was the slowest, oldest, most inefficient goddamn bartender I've ever seen. In any case, games were cheap at the Turf, and the guys who showed up could generally play.

Bar pool is almost always 8-ball, with the winner staying on the table. Folks stack up their quarters and the next challenger buys the game. If you're good, you can stay on a table for game after game and play for free. At the more crowded bars, you team up, so four people can play at once.

Billy and I were a great team. If I missed a shot, he'd make the next one. If he missed, I'd cover for him. We were comfortable playing at the Turf, and comfort breeds confidence, which bodes well.

The best piece of advice I've heard about pool came via Mark Ruffalo's character in the movie You Can Count on Me, when he tells a young kid something along the lines of "Don't take the shot until you know you can make it."

Once you have down some degree of technique, pool becomes far more mental than physical. For me, it has always been a game of confidence. If I think I can beat you, I will find a way to do it. And I often found that I played better at bars, after some (but not too much) of the liquid courage. It gave me an outlet for teenage aggression and a bit of a short man's complex. The thinking was simple: I'm not a big guy, I'm not looking to start a fight, but if I think you're a lout, I'm gonna kick your ass on this pool table.

When I had the confidence of finding the groove and rhythm ("fast and loose") to my game, born of the right buzz and years of playing, I could just go and go. Once, at a bar outside Jackson, Wyoming, my brother-in-law and I got on a table and nearly stayed all night. We played some outstanding games against tough competition, and we beat them all. The bar didn't close till late, but by 2:00, I'd had my fill, and though the table was ours to lose, I told my brother-in-law I was done for the night. He was full of buzz and excitement and was ready to play a few more hours. He said, "It's our table." I said, "You don't understand. We are not going to lose tonight. We'll be here till morning. Let's just give the table to someone else and go crash."

Grudgingly, he agreed. I was tired and ready for sleep. And when you're just playing for fun and bragging rights — as opposed to being into Minnesota Fats for big money (Jackie Gleason's greatest role) — you can just pick up and leave.

Paul Newman usually played the alpha male in his movies, exuding a disturbingly quiet and occasionally even humble confidence that he arguably felt in real life, where he had little need for pretense or the trappings of fame. His genes made him good looking, but that confidence was the result of hard work. Whether it was acting, or race car driving, or running a successful charity, or being a good husband and father, the guy knew how to work at it.

Shooting pool taught me that much about him.

Paul, we'll miss you. Your movies and your charity will live on. But now that you're gone, we can say with even better certainty, "Nobody can eat 50 eggs."

Comments

[Dan S.]

I liked Newman as an older actor, like in 'Color of Money' & 'Nobody's Fool'. Checking his bio now... It took until 60, but then he had the cash to get heavily into philanthropy, with great results. As a family guy, looks like he got a second chance. Divorced w/ an 8 & 5-yr-old? Ouch. Son died of a drug overdose? Yikes. At least it took until 83 for the chain smoking to have the final punch, though all that auto racing must have given him some close calls. Good for him! He took chances, lived his way, and ended with a full life.

Thank god for pool tables in bars. People need something to do when together, period. (golf, cards, Scrabble, whatever) Pool is beautiful - color, sound, physics, "touch", and weighty gear made of wood and slate. Simple rules, mostly social things that apply to life in general:

- Be patient, wait your turn.
- Act with clear intent.
- Never mock your partner or opponent.
- Never give advice unless it is asked for.
- Most importantly: Confidence is good for your game, but talk smack and you will surely end up sinking the "8"... with your balls still on the table, where somebody else will be bustin' them.

...and then you are back to waiting in line and/or "socializing" with strangers or even people you think you know - where there's too much talk about too little, etiquette without substance, and attitudes meeting mouths or worse.

I guess it's better to stretch an ego on a pool table. If you can smile as you pass the cue around, the worst you should head home with are a few "scratches". Have fun, work on your own game, and stay clear of people who talk too much.

I bet Newman loved pool in real life.