`Field of Dreams' to be Hens' feature presentation

6/6/2003
Kevin Costner, left, with Amy Madigan and Gaby Hoffman, speaks with Dwier Brown in the 1989 baseball drama Field of Dreams, which will be shown at Fifth Third Field.
Kevin Costner, left, with Amy Madigan and Gaby Hoffman, speaks with Dwier Brown in the 1989 baseball drama Field of Dreams, which will be shown at Fifth Third Field.

It'll be “Play Movie” at Fifth Third Field on Monday.

Because the Toledo Mud Hens won't be taking the field that night, ghostly baseball players will fill in for the first of three movie nights at the stadium this summer.

Field of Dreams, a 1989 baseball drama starring Kevin Costner, will fill the video screen on the scoreboard behind left field.

Viewers will watch the movie from the stands behind the visitors' dugout, Jason Griffin, a Mud Hens spokesman, said.

The stadium gates open at 7 p.m., and the movie begins at 7:45. Admission is $4, and the concession stands will be open.

Mr. Griffin said movie company rules didn't allow the team to advertise the title of the film, but it has been announced at recent games.

Two months before the stadium opened in April, 2002, the Mud Hens, CitiFest, Inc., and Lucas County officials proposed showing family movies on the stadium scoreboard when the team wasn't playing in town.

Mud Hens and CitiFest officials met to discuss mutual goals of generating excitement about the stadium and bringing people downtown.

Although a schedule of three or four movies was proposed, the stadium didn't show any films last year because the team wasn't ready.

“We wanted to make sure we did it right,” Mr. Griffin said.

The next two movies are scheduled for July 14 and Aug. 18, but what films will be shown hasn't been decided yet.