It stars Tom Hanks, Geena Davis, Madonna, Lori Petty, Jon Lovitz, David Strathairn, Garry Marshall, Rosie O'Donnell, and Bill Pullman and was written by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, from a story by Kelly Candaele and Kim Wilson.
It was a critical and commercial success, grossing $132.4 million worldwide and garnering acclaim for Marshall's direction and the performances of its ensemble cast.
In 2012, the Library of Congress selected it for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Scout Ernie Capadino attends an industrial-league softball game in Oregon and likes what he sees in Dottie, the catcher for a local dairy.
Dottie and Kit travel to Harvey Field in Chicago for tryouts; en route, they force Capadino to accept homely second baseman Marla Hooch.
They meet taxi dancer Mae "All-the-Way-Mae" Mordabito and her best friend, bouncer Doris Murphy, soft-spoken right fielder Evelyn Gardner, illiterate left fielder Shirley Baker, pitcher/shortstop and former Miss Georgia beauty queen Ellen Sue Gotlander, left field/relief pitcher Betty "Spaghetti" Horn, first baseman Helen Haley and Alice "Skeeter" Gaspers.
She gets a hit and, ignoring the third base coach's sign to stop, scores the winning run by knocking her sister over at the plate and dislodging the ball from Dottie's hand.
Back in the present at Cooperstown, Dottie is reunited with the other players, including Kit, Capadino and Lowenstein; she sees that Jimmy died a year earlier, in 1987.
She had never heard of the league, and contacted the film's creators, Kelly Candaele and Kim Wilson, to collaborate with the screenwriters, Babaloo Mandel and Lowell Ganz, on producing a screenplay for 20th Century Fox.
[15] Filming the game scenes involved many physical mishaps among the actors: Anne Ramsay broke her nose with a baseball mitt while trying to catch a ball, and the large bruise seen on Renée Coleman's thigh at one point in the movie was real.
[11] Discussing the skirts they wore playing in the film, Geena Davis said on MLB Network's Costas at the Movies in 2013, "Some of our real cast, from sliding into home, had ripped the skin off their legs.
[22] The final week of shooting was during late October 1991 in Cooperstown, New York, where 65 original AAGPBL members appeared in scenes recreating the induction of the league into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1988.
[23] Due to the length of the schedule, the cast entertained themselves by putting on an elaborate amateur production, Jesus Christ Superstar Goes Hawaiian.
[25] Although Madonna contributed "This Used to Be My Playground" to the film, featured over the closing credits, her recording was not included on the soundtrack album for contractual reasons.
The website's critical consensus reads: "Sentimental and light, but still thoroughly charming, A League of Their Own is buoyed by solid performances from a wonderful cast.
[35] Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote: "Though big of budget, A League of Their Own is one of the year's most cheerful, most relaxed, most easily enjoyable comedies.
"[36] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it three out of four stars, and wrote: "The movie has a real bittersweet charm.
What's fresh are the personalities of the players, the gradual unfolding of their coach and the way this early chapter of women's liberation fit into the hidebound traditions of professional baseball.
A short-lived series of the same title based on the film aired on CBS in April 1993, with Garry Marshall, Megan Cavanagh, Tracy Reiner, Freddie Simpson and Jon Lovitz reprising their roles.