Franklin Field hosts Eagles again for Disney's movie 'Invincible'

When watching Invincible, the viewer is treated to a bird's-eye-view panoramic of the now extinct Veterans' Stadium.

But as the camera passes over the top of the concrete giant, an astute viewer will notice that the field is not the artificial turf of the Vet but rather the Sprinturf of Penn's Franklin Field.

From July 28 through Aug. 20 of 2005, Disney essentially took over Franklin Field to film the movie, which chronicles the story of Vince Papale.

Papale -who previously worked as a part-time bartender - made the Eagles in 1974, as a wide receiver playing special teams through an open tryout, and quickly become a fan favorite.

The filming started the on the 28th with a shoot that ran from 6 p.m. until 7 a.m. the next morning. That night in July the snow-laden game between the Bengals and Eagles was filmed.

The crew began to transform Franklin Field into the Vet on July 11th. It was actually a return of sorts: Franklin Field was the home of the Eagles from 1958 through 1970, where Penn grad and center/linebacker Chuck Bednarik helped the Eagles win their last NFL Championship, in 1960.

However, Vince Papale's story takes place in 1976, well into the Veterans' Stadium era.

In order for such a large project to come to Penn and to go off without a hitch, it required a tremendous coordinated effort.

Penn and the Greater Philadelphia Film Office worked to convince Disney producers to film in Philadelphia and Franklin Field rather than the ironically contrary New York and Giants' Stadium.

Dave Bryan, the director of facilities and operations for athletics, said the sales pitch was simple: "The University of Pennsylvania can make this happen."

Bryan believes the proof was in the pudding, since Franklin Field had previously hosted film crews for Unbreakable, which was released in 2000.

On campus, Bryan needed to enlist the assistance and cooperation of athletics, coaches, facilities, parking, legal services, carpenters, electricians and the police.

In order to sculpt Franklin Field's endearing early-19th-century features into the cold monolithic quality of the late-20th-century Veterans' Stadium, more than digital imaging was necessary.

Film crews worked carefully to paint over field hockey and lacrosse lines with a shade of green that matched the rest of the turf. Padding was placed on the walls to mirror the Vet, a tunnel was constructed to resemble the entrance onto the field and Quakers signs and colors were replaced with Eagles green.

Other parts of the facility were utilized as well. The locker room was used for its authentic appearance; the press-conference scene was filmed in the lower north locker room as it had "the dungeon-like feel of Veterans' Stadium," according to Bryan. The fan line for the open tryout was filmed on the east concourse.

The stands were utilized to film the fan scenes. On one particularly aggressively hot August afternoon, a series of actors and stand-ins were relocated from one section of the stands to another, dressed in autumn attire, in order to create the illusion of a full stands.

Perhaps the most amusing incident occurred while filming at Hollenback for Papale's acceptance to the team when Bryan had to stop Mark Wahlberg, the star of the movie, from hitting golf balls off Rhodes Field.

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