1. A DANI MENKIN FILM
CINEMATOGRAPHER DAVIDGURFINKEL EXECUTIVEPRODUCERS ILANHEITNER BENNYMENASHE YONATANNIR RESEARCH YAELBIRON EDITING SHLOMISHALOM
EDITINGADVISOR ARIKLAHAVLEIBOVICH ALTERNATEEDITOR NOAMLEVY PRODUCTIONMANAGER ALMOGGUREVICH LITALMOSKOVICH-WANDERSMAN
ASSISTANTPRODUCER OFIRWANDERSMAN MUSIC ISAARSHULMAN SOUNDDESIGN PHILIPPEGOZLAN SOUND SHIMSHONYANAI GRAPHICDESIGN&AFTEREFFECTS DOODEVAN
POSTPRODUCER ALMOGGUREVICH MARKETINGPRODUCERS TALIWAXMAN OMERHAR-SHAI ASSISTANTDIRECTOR ROIMAOZ WRITTENANDDIRECTEDBY DANIMENKIN
HEYJUDEPRODUCTIONSPRESENT
Design:doodEvan
Writer, Director, Producer Dani Menkin
Executive Producers Roberta Grossman, Nancy Spielberg
Before there was the Miracle On Ice...
there was the Miracle on Hardwood.

2. recounts the story of how one Tel Aviv team
no one thought could win toppled the four-time
defending European Champions and put Israel
firmly on the map. Featuring interviews with
the American athletes who made history,
“On the Map” combines the pulse- pounding
action of a high-stakes game with an
incendiary political situation at the height
of the Cold War. The film honors Israeli
heroes, mesmerizes fans of the game and
captures the spirit of a nation triumphant
and victorious against all odds.
I
n 1977, Maccabi Tel Aviv, Israel’s pro
basketball team, assembled a talented
roster of American and Israeli athletes.
No one thought they would get very far. Not even in Israel. And yet, they fought and played,
dribbled and dunked their way to the playoffs in the European semi-finals.
Their fight would pit Israel against the formidable Soviet Union, whose Red Army Moscow team
had strung together four undefeated seasons on the European stage. The Soviet Union had
boycotted Israel for the previous decade and supplied weapons to Arab nations surrounding the
Jewish state. Now the two nations would fight it out on the basketball court.
The game was played in neutral Belgium. The heavily favored Soviet team refused to play
in Tel Aviv and would not allow the Israeli athletes into Russia, simply because they did not
recognize the right for Israel to exist.
On the Map,” a fast-moving
and awe-inspiring documentary,
Still demoralized after the 1973
Yom Kippur War, Israel was hungry for a collective, uplifting event.
“

3. On February 17, 1977, throughout Israel, streets
emptied and restaurants went dark. The entire
nation gathered in their homes to watch the game
on the one and only TV channel.
Leading the team was the New Jersey all-star high school player and captain Tal Brody. Along-
side him were American Jews Lou Silver, Bob Griffin and Eric Minkin; as well as Idaho-born
Jim Boatwright, the team’s top scorer; and Aulcie Perry, a 6-foot 10-inch center whose stalled
pro career in the U.S. led him to Israel. When Brody’s team beat the odds and defeated the
Soviets by a 12-point margin, 91-79, Brody shouted, “We are on the map, not only in sport
but in EVERYTHING!”
Israel went wild.
Israel, whose boundaries
and borders were contested,
whose lines were even erased
from many maps around the
world, was now firmly
on the map.
After Russia, Israel went on to defeat Italy and won the historic European Cup Basketball
Championship title. When the team returned to Israel, 200,000 fans waited in Tel Aviv to
welcome them home.
Israel was triumphant and victorious against all odds.
A metaphor for a country even today.
I
t was much
more than
a game.

4. Writer, Director, Producer Dani Menkin is an award-winning filmmaker
(Dolphin Boy, 2011; 39 Pounds of Love, 2005) and founder of Hey Jude Productions. His films
have been sold to Disney and HBO Productions. His latest feature film Is That You? (2014)
screened at film festivals in Hollywood, Montreal, Haifa and Syracuse and at the 28th
Israeli
Film Festival in LA. It has also won “Best Indie Film of the Year” award (2014), and
has been nominated for the “Best Film of the Year” award (2014) by the Israeli Academy.
Executive Producer Roberta Grossman, a co-founder of Katahdin
Productions along with Lisa Thomas, has written and produced more than forty hours of
documentary film and television. Grossman produced and directed Blessed Is the Match:
The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh and Hava Nagila (The Movie); and directed
Above and Beyond, a documentary about American World War II pilots who fought for
Israel in the 1948 War.
Executive Producer Nancy Spielberg is the producer of the award-
winning film Above and Beyond. She grew up surrounded by the film industry, where she
worked on her brother Steven’s early films. An accomplished businesswoman, fundraiser
and philanthropist, Spielberg has served as consultant on the Oscar-winning documentary
Chernobyl Heart, and is executive producer of Elusive Justice: The Search for Nazi War
Criminals, which aired nationally on PBS, and the forthcoming documentary Mimi and Dona.
She is also executive producing Who Will Write Our History, with director Roberta Grossman.
For more information:
Dani Menkin
310-279-0345
dani@heyjudeproductions.com
Roberta Grossman
323-424-4210
rgrossman@katahdinproductions.com
The
Creators