Alojzy Ehrlich

We finally had a chance to watch "Marty Supreme". It's very very Jewy, and Timotheeeee Chalamet is pretty damn fantastic in making you root for, well, a scumbag. As we discussed previously, his character is loosely based on former table tennis great Marty Reisman. (We're not sure if Reisman was such a scoundrel as the film's Marty Mauser, but how many ping pong players get a movie out of their life story?)

But let's not talk about Chalamet's Mauser. Let's talk about another character who had a real-life double: Marty's friend Bela Kletzki, based on Alojzy Ehrlich.

Ehrlich was a world-class ping pong player, who took silver at three world championships to go with three bronzes. All of these occurred before World War II... And those who saw the movie understand why, for, just like Ehrlich, the film's Kletzki talks about his experience in a concentration camp.

This leads to the film's most memorable scene, when Kletzki talks about diffusing bombs for the Nazis... (spoiler alert, do not click if you plan to see the movie.). This really happened to Ehrlich!

Of course, the movie takes some liberties with his story. In the film, Kletzki is a Hungarian Jew.

In real life, Ehrlich was a Polish one.

function spoiler() { s1.innerHTML = ", finding a beehive, smearing honey all over his body, and letting his fellow prisoners lick it off him"; }