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http://dethroner.com/2008/03/17/the-wires-david-simon-on-omars-spider-man-jump/
The Wire’s David Simon on Omar’s Spider-Man Jump Published by Joel March 17th, 2008 in Survival, TV. Share This
If you haven’t been watching The Wire, one of the characters jumps something like three or four stories out of an apartment building and is able to hobble off. From an interview Alan Sepinwall’s blog:
Is it true that Donnie (Andrews, the inspiration for Omar) in real life jumped off a balcony the same height that Omar did?
Actually, two floors higher.
Two floors higher?
The Murphy Homes. He also jumped off the rail bridge at Poplar Grove, onto the rail bed. That was probably about three stories. And he hurt his ankle. It’s just true. Those jumps, by an athletic person, can actually be made and are made, routinely. By a non-athletic person? if I made it, I’d be all over the pavement and they’d pick me up with a spoon. If you made it, they’d pick you up with a spoon. When 28-year-old Donnie Andrews makes that jump because he has to, sometimes he makes it. It’s funny: I’m doing this thing now with recon Marines, “Generation Kill.” And some of them had no problem with the jump. They just started telling stories about recon training. I don’t know whether to believe them or not, but I do believe Donnie.
It was a story I actually used, I wrote about the first time back in 1990. That story was all through the ghetto: “They had him cornered, and motherfucker jumped off the railroad bridge and kept running. Did not want to die that day.” But we did want it to feel a little bit mythic, and “What the fuck?” because it fit with the general arc of Greek tragedy.
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