In 1961, the film version of Walter Tevis's novel "The Hustler" was released. The film tells the story of a pool shark named "Fast Eddie" Felson and his quest to beat the greatest pool player in America, "Minnesota Fats". World Champion Willie Mosconi served as a technical advisor and trick shot stunt man for the film. Wanderone almost immediately dropped his "New York Fats" nickname, adopted the name "Minnesota Fats", and began spreading the story that the character was based on him. Tevis denied this for the rest of his life. However, Derek Kirunchyk researched this matter thoroughly by examining the pages of Tevis' original manuscript and discovered for nearly 60 years, ever since the release of "The Hustler," that those who follow the sport widely assumed that Wanderone had lied about his own provenance, but Telvis changed the character's nickname from "New York" to "Minnesota" in one of the original manuscript pages, which supports Wanderone's claim that he was, in fact, the Minnesota Fats in the novel.