In December, Sony Pictures will release Concussion, a drama starring Will Smith as Bennet Omalu, the doctor who discovered chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) as a result of repeated brain injuries, the kind that NFL players sustain regularly. The trailer is full of “You need to back off!” and “These people are powerful!”-type warnings. You know, the kind of things weak-willed people say to Will Smith before he clenches his jaw and does his hero thing in plenty of movies.
But Dr. Omalu really did discover CTE, and really was pressured by the NFL to hide or change his findings to preserve the sacred shield of football. It’s something the NFL does all the time. So if Hollywood makes a movie about the NFL silencing whistleblowers, surely it would be too poetic for the NFL to try to suppress details of that very practice in said film. That would be an ouroboros of public relations.
Well, according to the New York Times, Roger Goodell did just that, exerting pressure on Sony to change the script. Here’s an excerpt of an executive’s email that the Times obtained:
“We’ll develop messaging with the help of N.F.L. consultant to ensure that we are telling a dramatic story and not kicking the hornet’s nest.”
Supposedly, the film was altered to shift the focus more onto Smith’s character as a whistleblower and away from the fact that the NFL is the bad guy, though I’m unclear on who else the bad guy would be. Luckily, Concussion‘s director, Peter Landesman, is here to assure us that the dramatic focus of the film has nothing to do with pressure from the NFL (via Fox News and the AP):
“We always intended to make an entertaining, hard-hitting film about Dr. Omalu’s David-and-Goliath story, which played out like a Hollywood thriller,” said Landesman. “Anyone who sees the movie will know that it never once compromises the integrity and the power of the real story.”
That is not the most convincing denial. Landesman essentially concedes that the focus lies on the more Hollywood aspects of the story — or, the more Will Smith-y aspects — and doesn’t mention the NFL at all, much like the trailer doesn’t mention the NFL by name, or spotlight who exactly Smith-as-Omalu is fighting. I’m sure that the David-and-Goliath story will be just as compelling if Goliath spends the whole movie hiding behind a curtain and sending faceless attorneys to threaten David.
Concussion opens Christmas Day, in the heart of the NFL’s playoff race. I’m sure Roger Goodell is taking a real hands-off approach to this one.
(Via Fox News and New York Times)
