Joe Kovler has always loved telling stories, be they factual or fictional.
“Camp Hero” is a mixture of the two.
On Thursday, July 25, the East Hampton resident will discuss his narrative screenplay—which melds the historical elements of the Cuban Missile Crisis and “Operation Pedro Pan” with the fictional adventures of two young boys—at 6:30 p.m. at the Montauk Library, not far from the script’s setting at Camp Hero.
“Not many Americans knew about Operation Pedro Pan because it existed in the shadows of Cuban-American relations leading up to the Cuban Missile Crisis, a 13-day confrontation from October 16 to October 28, 1962, between the USA and the Soviet Union, when Americans discovered the presence of Soviet ballistic missiles in Cuba,” a press release said. “Operation Peter Pan, or Operación Pedro Pan, was a mass evacuation of over 14,000 unaccompanied Cuban minors to the United States that took place between 1960 and 1962. It operated covertly out of fear that it would be viewed as an anti-Castro political enterprise.”
While there is no historical record of Camp Hero being used to shelter Pedro Pan kids, Mr. Kovler will discuss what inspired him to use Montauk and Camp Hero as the film’s location, and how the historical importance of the secret evacuation program is relevant to the plight of immigrants and refugees as they are welcomed with open arms by some, and bullied and rejected by others.
Admission is free. For more information, call 631-668 3377 or visit montauklibrary.org.
Staff Writer on Jul 17, 2019