Remember the XFL?
Though it may be regarded as a joke today, the XFL was a big deal for a few months in 2001. The brainchild of the WWF’s Vince McMahon, the XFL was a football league that, like the USFL before it, would play during the NFL’s off-season. McMahon promised that, if the NFL was now the “No Fun League,” the XFL would be the “Extra Fun League.” McMahon’s longtime friend and the President of NBC sports, Dick Ebersol, purchased the rights to broadcast the XFL’s first two seasons.
Ebersol and McMahon put together the XFL (8 teams and 2 divisions) in just a year’s time. They recruited players who hadn’t been able to find a place in NFL. Using many of the same techniques that he perfected in the world of professional wrestling, McMahon encouraged the players to be big personalities and allowed them to pick their own nicknames. Rod Smart would briefly become a star as He Hate Me while another player requested to be known as Teabagger. McMahon tweaked the rules, encouraging faster and more aggressive play. Instead of a coin flip, each game would start with two opposing players scrambling for the ball. The XFL was not only more violent than the NFL but it also had sexier cheerleaders.
In 2001, I was really excited for the XFL. It was everything that an 18 year-old male football fan could hope for. I was one of the 14 million people who watched the very first broadcast. I watched half of the second broadcast and that was it. I lost interest and I was not alone. The XFL started with higher ratings than expected but the final games of that inaugural season set records for being the lowest-rated prime time sports telecasts in history.
What went wrong? That’s what ESPN’s latest 30 for 30 documentary, This Was The XFL, explains. Directed by Dick Ebersol’s son, Charlie, This Was The XFL features interviews with McMahon, the senior Ebersol, players like Rod Smart and Tommy Maddox, and sports journalists like Bob Costas. The XFL’s rise and demise is presented as being a comedy of errors. Already viewed with skepticism because of McMahon’s unsavory reputation, the XFL was doomed by a combination of terrible luck and bad gameplay that confirmed why many XFL players couldn’t find a place in the NFL. During the first week, several players were injured during the opening scramble. In the 2nd week, a power outage interrupted the broadcast of a game in Los Angeles. With ratings in freefall, McMahon resorted to playing up the cheerleaders and sending Gov. Jesse “The Body” Ventura onto the field so that he could harass the coaches during the game. Trying to do damage control, McMahon appeared on The Bob Costas Show and their hostile interview is one of the highlights of the documentary. Even if the league ultimately failed, it is impossible not to admire McMahon’s determination to shake things up.
The XFL’s first season was also its last but, as This Was The XFL makes clear, its legacy is still evident today. Miked-up players, the skycam, sideline interviews, all of these are the legacy of the XFL. Even Jerry Jones, when interviewed, says that the XFL changed the way that NFL football is broadcast.
With this being Super Bowl weekend, take a moment to raise a toast to the memory of the XFL.
Quarterback Cat Catlan (Charlton Heston) used to be one of the greats. For fifteen years, he has been a professional football player. He probably should have retired after he led the New Orleans Saints to their first championship but, instead, the stubborn Cat kept playing. Now, he is 40 years old and struggling to keep up with the younger players. His coach (John Randolph) says that Cat has another two or three years left in him but the team doctor (G.D. Spradlin who, ten years later, played a coach in North Dallas Forty) says that one more strong hit could not only end Cat’s career but possibly his life as well. Two of former Cat’s former teammates (Bruce Dern and Bobby Troup) offer to help Cat find a job off the field but Cat tells them the same thing that he tells his long-suffering wife (Jessica Walter). He just has to win one more championship.
The year is 1997 and Troy Duffy is on top of the world. The Boston-bred Troy is a bartender and bouncer who has just sold his first script to Harvey Weinstein and Miramax. Weinstein is not only going to give him fifteen million dollars to make The Boondock Saints but he is also going to help Troy buy his own bar. Troy’s band, The Brood, is on the verge of signing a contract with Maverick Records. Stars like Mark Wahlberg and Ewan McGregor are eager to meet with him, though Duffy offends McGregor with his outspoken support of the death penalty. Miramax suggests that Duffy should cast Sylvester Stallone, Keanu Reeves and Ethan Hawke in his movie. Duffy calls Keanu a “fucking punk.”
In 1970s New York City, Danny Ciello (Treat Williams) is a self-described “prince of the city.” A narcotics detective, Ciello is the youngest member of the Special Investigations Unit. Because of their constant success, the SIU is given wide latitude by their superiors at the police department. The SIU puts mobsters and drug dealers behind bars. They get results. If they sometimes cut corners or skim a little money for themselves, who cares?
Who was the boss of bosses? According to this movie, he was Paul Castellano. A cousin-by-marriage to the notorious crime boss Carlo Gambino, Castellano grew up in New York City and first became a made man in the 1930s. After four decades of loyal service, Castellano succeeded Carlo as the boss of the Gambino Crime Family. As portrayed in this movie, Castellano attempted to keep the Gambinos out of the drug trade and tried to steer both his biological and his crime family into legitimate businesses. However, not everyone appreciated Castellano’s vision of the future and, in 1985, he was assassinated on the orders of his eventual successor, John Gotti.
London. 1961. Doctor Stephen Ward (played by John Hurt) is an artist and an osteopath. He counts among his patients some of the most distinguished men and women in British society, including the Minister of War, John Profumo (Ian McKellen). After meeting two young dancers, Christine Keeler (Joanne Whalley) and Mandy Rice-Davies (Bridget Fonda), Stephen becomes their mentor, the Henry Higgins to their Eliza Doolittle.
