Radio

Anybody plan on seeing this movie?


Movie tunes in to T.L. Hanna's Radio
Posted Saturday, October 18, 2003 - 6:19 pm


By Scott Keepfer
STAFF WRITER
[email protected]


The real thing: James Robert 'Radio' Kennedy patrols the sidelines at a T.L. Hanna football game this season. Staff/Bart Boatwright
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ANDERSON — Not much has changed about James Robert "Radio" Kennedy since that first day he wandered upon coach Harold Jones' football practice some 38 years ago at Anderson's McCants Junior High School.
Sure, he's become a staple of daily life at T.L. Hanna High, where the now-57-year-old mentally challenged man has carved a niche in the hearts and minds of not only a school, but an entire city and state as well.

It is that relationship, which was fostered by Jones — the eventual and since-retired football coach at Hanna — that has provided the backdrop for the new film "Radio," which debuts in theaters nationwide Friday.

A 1996 article in Sports Illustrated magazine about Radio convinced Hollywood filmmaker Mike Tollin that he should make a movie about Radio.

Throughout the pre-release hype of the movie, which has been building for more than a year now, Radio has remained an unwavering constant.

He still reports to the school nurse like clockwork every morning, then heads to the Hanna gym to walk his designated laps. Most days, Radio will then get a shave — courtesy of special education teacher Miragene Lever — and take a shower before heading to class for his daily "tests," which entail staying within the lines with his crayons in his Scooby Doo coloring book.

But things likely will be different now, now that someone in Hollywood has crafted a film about his very existence and the way he's brought humility and humor and unconditional love to all who have passed through the halls of Hanna High.

Yet Radio tends to resist change.

Years ago, when it was suggested that Radio was finally a "senior" and would be eligible for graduation and possible departure the following June, Radio countered that he was still "just a junior."

He has continued to declare himself a junior for at least a couple of decades now, which is a good thing for each and every class that has come and gone, for it enabled each of them to get to know and appreciate him in a special way.

Class of '72? They remember Radio, for that's when he truly became a fixture at all Hanna sporting events from football games to track meets.

Class of '78? Many of them will recall how Radio would always come to a complete stop 300 yards into the 440-yard dash to pull up his athletic socks.

Class of '99? That's when Radio's wallet was stolen at school, and the football team immediately formed a "posse" to locate the thief (the wallet was returned the next day).

Class of 2003? "Coach Radio" is pictured with the junior varsity soccer team (among others) in the football program, for goodness' sakes.

But surely Radio will be a changed man now, what with his name splashed across every television set and theater marquee from Seneca to Spokane.

"I took him to the mall the other day, and people are honking their horns and yelling out their windows, 'Hey Radio,' and 'Hey, Mr. Hollywood,'" Lever said. "And he just waved just like he always has."

Still acknowledging the masses, huh?

Yep, regardless of where he is or what he happens to be doing.

"You excited about the movie, Radio?" someone asked along the football sidelines at Hanna's game against Greenwood two Fridays ago.

"Gotta wear my suit!" he says.

Suit? Aha! Perhaps Radio is a changed man.

But then one recalls that Radio has worn that suit before, like the time he escorted and danced with special ed teacher Lever at the prom. Or the time he bounced around the stage while doing his best James Brown impersonation at a school talent show. Or each Sunday morning, when he hops on a church bus like clockwork to sing in the choir at the Generostee Baptist Church in nearby Starr.

Within the suit, a 57-year-old heart revs with adrenaline, but the child in him is very much the same.

For there he was last Friday night, doing the same things he's done on the Hanna sidelines every football Friday night for the past 30-plus years now, hugging players, hugging cheerleaders, hugging the water boy — pleading to any and all defensive players within earshot to "get the quarterback!"

Same uninhibited smile.

Same handshake.

Same old Radio.

"I don't think (the movie) is going to change Radio a bit," says Jones.

Says Allison Boozer, another of Radio's special education teachers: "We certainly wouldn't want him to be any different; he's perfect just the way he is."

Monetarily speaking, Radio won't be changed much, either. He received a lump sum when filming on the movie began last October, but he won't be moving to Bel Air anytime soon.

"It's not going to make Radio rich, but it will help him," Jones said.

Lest Radio decide to change, there are those who will be quick to restore order. Lever will see to that.

"I said, 'Radio, I know you're famous now, but you've always been famous around here,'" Lever said. "And you may be a big star, but you're still going to have to say 'please' and 'thank you.'"

Some things never change, and sometimes that is good, especially in a world of constant change.

Come Monday morning, a week from now, the premiere of "Radio" will be but a memory, the red carpet rolled up and all the stars gone.

Except for Radio.

Radio will be back at school, resuming his junior year for the umpteenth time.

He'll go about his daily activities like clockwork, even though he can't tell time.

A quick visit to the school nurse.

Walking his designated laps around the gym.

A shower and a shave.

A Scooby Doo coloring book and a fresh box of crayons.

With, as always, a smile on his face.

 

We might see it. Hard to go wrong with Ed Harris and Cuba Gooding Jr.

 

Man, that's a good story.

About as good as the kid from Ohio (Kentucky maybe?) that "ran" for a touchdown in a high school game last year even though there's no way he could've ever played in a real football game.

 

This was in last week's SI, by Rick Reilly. This kid goes to the same school.
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Why do they come? Why do they hang around to watch the slowest high school cross-country runner in America? Why do they want to see a kid finish the 3.1 miles in 51 minutes when the winner did it in 16?

Why do they cry? Why do they nearly break their wrists applauding a junior who falls flat on his face almost every race? Why do they hug a teenager who could be beaten by any other kid running backward?

Why do they do it? Why do all of his teammates go back out on the course and run the last 10 minutes of every race with him? Why do other teams do it too? And the girls' teams? Why run all the way back out there to pace a kid running like a tortoise with bunions?

Why?

Because Ben Comen never quits.

See, Ben has a heart just slightly larger than the Chicago Hyatt. He also has cerebral palsy. The disease doesn't mess with his intellect -- he gets A's and B's -- but it seizes his muscles and contorts his body and gives him the balance of a Times Square drunk. Yet there he is, competing for the Hanna High cross-country team in Anderson, S.C., dragging that wracked body over rocks and fallen branches and ditches. And people ask, Why?

"Because I feel like I've been put here to set an example," says Ben, 16. "Anybody can find something they can do -- and do it well. I like to show people that you can either stop trying or you can pick yourself up and keep going. It's just more fun to keep going."

It must be, because faced with what Ben faces, most of us would quit.

Imagine what it feels like for Ben to watch his perfectly healthy twin, Alex, or his younger brother, Chris, run like rabbits for Hanna High, while Ben runs like a man whacking through an Amazon thicket. Imagine never beating anybody to the finish line. Imagine dragging along that stubborn left side, pulling that unbending tire iron of a leg around to the front and pogo-sticking off it to get back to his right.

Worse, he lifts his feet so little that he trips on anything -- a Twinkie-sized rock, a licorice-thick branch, the cracks between linoleum tiles. But he won't let anybody help him up. "It messes up my flow," he says. He's not embarrassed, just mad.

Worst, he falls hard. His brain can't send signals fast enough for his arms to cushion his fall, so he often smacks his head or his face or his shoulder. Sometimes his mom, Joan, can't watch.

"I've been coaching cross-country for 31 years," says Hanna's Chuck Parker, "and I've never met anyone with the drive that Ben has. I don't think there's an inch of that kid I haven't had to bandage up."

But never before Ben finishes the race. Like Rocky Marciano, Ben finishes bloody and bruised, but never beaten. Oh, he always loses -- Ben barely finishes ahead of the sunset, forget other runners. But he hasn't quit once. Through rain, wind or welt, he always crosses the finish line.

Lord, it's some sight when he gets there: Ben clunking his way home, shepherded by all those kids, while the cheerleaders screech and parents try to holler encouragement, only to find nothing coming out of their voice boxes.

The other day Ben was coming in with his huge army, Ben's Friends, his face stoplight red and tortured, that laborious gait eating up the earth inch by inch, when he fell not 10 yards from the line. There was a gasp from the parents and a second of silence from the kids. But then Ben went through the 15-second process of getting his bloody knees under him, his balance back and his forward motion going again -- and he finished. From the roar you'd have thought he just won Boston.

"Words can't describe that moment," says his mom. "I saw grown men just stand there and cry."

Ben can get to you that way. This is a kid who builds wheelchair ramps for Easter Seals, spends nights helping at an assisted-living home, mans a drill for Habitat for Humanity, devotes hours to holding the hand of a disabled neighbor, Miss Jessie, and plans to run a marathon and become a doctor. Boy, the youth of today, huh?

Oh, one aside: Hanna High is also the home of a mentally challenged man known as Radio, who has been the football team's assistant for more than 30 years. Radio gained national attention in a 1996 Sports Illustrated story by Gary Smith and is the hero of a major movie that opens nationwide on Oct. 24.

Feel like you could use a little dose of humanity? Get yourself to Hanna. And while you're there, go out and join Ben's Friends.

You'll be amazed what a little jog can do for your heart.

 

Looks like a great movie. I'm hysterical crying just from the previews! Pass the tissue, please!

 

Hey guys, don't read that article VP posted while you are at work. Go home and read it, and make sure your wife isn't around.

 

Got dusty over there too, huh?

 

Uh....no....of course not.

 

I would love to see one of his races, but don't know that I can get down there before the season ends.

 

Yeah, looks like a great movie for sure. I read that story at work. Glad I have a door and nobody was around. I have seen some of the hype interviews for this movie, but I actually think they will all hold true.