In another universe, this summer’s sports-centric programming looks quite a bit different than it does in our current (and very strange) reality, from major league sports like baseball and basketball not existing in a literal bubble to the only-every-four-years spectacle of the Olympics unspooling in Japan. In fact, the latest edition of the Summer Olympics would have kicked off this very week, with the world’s best athletes gathering in and around Tokyo for two weeks of competition. Brett Rapkin’s “The Weight of Gold,” which assembles a sterling array of Olympic athletes to talk candidly about their struggles with mental health, starts with a necessary nod to what would have been another entry in classic Olympic mania.
It even suggests an important question: perhaps they’re better without it? It’s an idea worth pondering, especially as Rapkin’s documentary steadily builds over the course of just one hour to show,...
It even suggests an important question: perhaps they’re better without it? It’s an idea worth pondering, especially as Rapkin’s documentary steadily builds over the course of just one hour to show,...
- 7/29/2020
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
In today’s TV news roundup, HBO revealed the trailer for “The Weight of Gold,” a documentary about Olympians’ mental health challenges, and Netflix announced the premiere date for its upcoming animated comedy “Hoops.”
Greenlights
Epix announced “By Whatever Means Necessary: The Times of Godfather of Harlem,” a four-part docuseries that explores the music scene of 1960s Harlem and connects it to music trends seen today, will premiere this fall. The series will combine moments from the cabler’s drama series “Godfather of Harlem” with archival footage and interviews to tell the story of Harlem musicians who used their voices, instruments and music as weapons against oppression. Contemporary artists will be featured as well. The docuseries is executive produced by Nina Yang Bongiovi, Forest Whitaker, Kasseem “Swizz Beatz” Dean and Keith McQuirter.
First Looks
HBO unveiled the official trailer for “The Weight of Gold,” set to premiere July 29. Featuring interviews with Michael Phelps,...
Greenlights
Epix announced “By Whatever Means Necessary: The Times of Godfather of Harlem,” a four-part docuseries that explores the music scene of 1960s Harlem and connects it to music trends seen today, will premiere this fall. The series will combine moments from the cabler’s drama series “Godfather of Harlem” with archival footage and interviews to tell the story of Harlem musicians who used their voices, instruments and music as weapons against oppression. Contemporary artists will be featured as well. The docuseries is executive produced by Nina Yang Bongiovi, Forest Whitaker, Kasseem “Swizz Beatz” Dean and Keith McQuirter.
First Looks
HBO unveiled the official trailer for “The Weight of Gold,” set to premiere July 29. Featuring interviews with Michael Phelps,...
- 7/20/2020
- by Eli Countryman
- Variety Film + TV
Michael Phelps, Shaun White, Sasha Cohen and many other Olympians examine their relationship with “post-Olympic depression” in a new documentary, The Weight of Gold, which released its first trailer on Monday.
The HBO Sports film will debut on HBO and on streaming via HBO Max on Wednesday, July 29th at 9:00 p.m. Et, around when the Summer Olympics were scheduled to take place in Tokyo, Japan, this year — prior to the coronavirus pandemic.
In the trailer, athletes open up about how “40 seconds will dictate our human lives,” before the...
The HBO Sports film will debut on HBO and on streaming via HBO Max on Wednesday, July 29th at 9:00 p.m. Et, around when the Summer Olympics were scheduled to take place in Tokyo, Japan, this year — prior to the coronavirus pandemic.
In the trailer, athletes open up about how “40 seconds will dictate our human lives,” before the...
- 7/20/2020
- by Claire Shaffer
- Rollingstone.com
"It's gold... And then what?" HBO has released a trailer for The Weight of Gold, a film by award-winning sports history filmmaker Brett Rapkin. The revealing and powerful documentary explores the mental health challenges that Olympic athletes often face in deeply personal detail. The film debuts later this month at the same time as the 2020 Summer Games with 11,000 world class athletes in attendance were slated to be competing in Tokyo, Japan. It features accounts from Olympic athletes who share their own struggles with mental health issues, including Michael Phelps, Jeremy Bloom, Lolo Jones, Gracie Gold, Bode Miller, Shaun White, and many others. HBO has been releasing an impressive slate of compelling, honest, eye-opening doc films these last few years about so many different topics. This one looks like an excellent double feature with the doc In Search of Greatness, also about the passion of athletes and the never-ending push to be the best.
- 7/20/2020
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Michael Phelps is the most decorated Olympian of all time, but what’s left to accomplish after you’ve proved you’re the best in the world? In the new documentary “The Weight of Gold,” Phelps takes a long look at life after the Olympics and how he was not alone in experiencing depression after winning it all.
“The Weight of Gold” is an HBO Sports documentary executive produced by Phelps and features interviews with Olympians who discuss going their entire lives without normal childhoods, without outside skills or interests beyond their sport, without any plans after the Olympics and whose entire lives have been defined by a rapid, 40-second race.
“We’re just so lost. A good 80 percent, maybe more, develop a post-Olympic depression,” Phelps says in the documentary trailer. “I thought of myself as just a swimmer, and not a human being, and that’s where I thought,...
“The Weight of Gold” is an HBO Sports documentary executive produced by Phelps and features interviews with Olympians who discuss going their entire lives without normal childhoods, without outside skills or interests beyond their sport, without any plans after the Olympics and whose entire lives have been defined by a rapid, 40-second race.
“We’re just so lost. A good 80 percent, maybe more, develop a post-Olympic depression,” Phelps says in the documentary trailer. “I thought of myself as just a swimmer, and not a human being, and that’s where I thought,...
- 7/20/2020
- by Brian Welk
- The Wrap
HBO has acquired and set a premiere date for The Weight of Gold, a feature documentary on the mental health challenges that Olympic athletes often face. All-time medal champ Michael Phelps is among the subjects, along with Shaun White, Bode Miller and others.
The film also features Jeremy Bloom, Lolo Jones, Gracie Gold, Apolo Anton Ohno, Sasha Cohen, David Boudia, Katie Uhlaender and the late Jeret Peterson And Steven Holcomb.
Directed by Brett Rapkin and produced by Podium Pictures in association with Octagon, The Weight of Gold will premiere at 9 p.m. Wednesday, July 29 — when the 2020 Tokyo Games were to have been going on before the event was postponed by the coronavirus pandemic.
The docu spotlights Olympic athletes, a group that has long quietly battled its own mental health crisis and now is grappling with the unprecedented postponement of the 2020 Olympics and all its implications. The film seeks to inspire the discussion of mental health,...
The film also features Jeremy Bloom, Lolo Jones, Gracie Gold, Apolo Anton Ohno, Sasha Cohen, David Boudia, Katie Uhlaender and the late Jeret Peterson And Steven Holcomb.
Directed by Brett Rapkin and produced by Podium Pictures in association with Octagon, The Weight of Gold will premiere at 9 p.m. Wednesday, July 29 — when the 2020 Tokyo Games were to have been going on before the event was postponed by the coronavirus pandemic.
The docu spotlights Olympic athletes, a group that has long quietly battled its own mental health crisis and now is grappling with the unprecedented postponement of the 2020 Olympics and all its implications. The film seeks to inspire the discussion of mental health,...
- 6/29/2020
- by Erik Pedersen
- Deadline Film + TV
As someone with little interest in or knowledge of baseball beyond the basics, it was refreshing to find that 5-time Emmy winner Brett Rapkin‘s biopic of controversial pitcher Bill Lee, “Spaceman,” is more a study of an American anomaly than a breakdown of the sport itself. Rapkin’s promise is to take us on a journey […]
The post Baseball Biopic ‘Spaceman’ Is Underwhelming & Conventional [Review] appeared first on The Playlist.
The post Baseball Biopic ‘Spaceman’ Is Underwhelming & Conventional [Review] appeared first on The Playlist.
- 8/19/2016
- by Michael Garmonsway
- The Playlist
It takes real resolve to stand up for your beliefs, but it takes courage not to quit after the pressure mounts, especially when life all but quits on you. That’s what happened with left-handed pitcher Bill “Spaceman” Lee, an outspoken, controversial figure who played for the Boston Red Sox and later the Montreal Expos. The new biographical film “Spaceman” follows the true story of Lee (played by Josh Duhamel) after he was let go by the Expos after clashing with management and protesting the release of a teammate. After spiraling downward trying to catch on with another pro team, Lee finds a lifeline in an undermanned local Senior League that desperately wants him to join. Lee casts aside his ego and finds true freedom by realizing he doesn’t need to be a professional to play baseball. Watch an exclusive clip from the film below.
Read More: Review: Southern...
Read More: Review: Southern...
- 8/12/2016
- by Vikram Murthi
- Indiewire
"I ain't ready to write my memoirs yet, I am ?" Filmbuff has unveiled the new full-length trailer for stoner baseball drama Spaceman, about the true story of baseball player Bill "Spaceman" Lee, who was a big-time advocate of marijuana. A very nicely-bearded Josh Duhamel plays Bill Lee, and the cast includes Ernie Hudson, W. Earl Brown, Sterling K. Brown, Carlos Leal, Peter Mackenzie and Emma Rose Maloney. The first teaser trailer for Spaceman didn't show too much, but this trailer gives us much more to work with, and it seems like an amusing and entertaining tale of stoner-dom. Lee actually pitched in the two games during the 1975 World Series for the Red Sox. This seems like a perfect movie for a Sunday afternoon. Here's the new full-length trailer (+ poster) for Brett Rapkin's Spaceman, direct from Filmbuff's YouTube: From the executive producer of Bull Durham and White Men Can't Jump comes the film Spaceman,...
- 7/22/2016
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
The first trailer has been released for the Josh Duhamel-led "Spaceman". Brett Rapkin helms the film about Bill 'Spaceman' Lee, a southpaw baseball pitcher in the twilight of his career who was bounced from the Montreal Expos and essentially banned from the sport. Even so, it didn't stop him from taking the mound and breaking records.
Josh Duhamel plays Lee in the film, a man blackballed by the rest of the league for his outspoken left-wing politics and notoriously enthusiastic drug use. Even so he refuses to quit the game. The film opens in cinemas and hits VOD on August 19th.
Josh Duhamel plays Lee in the film, a man blackballed by the rest of the league for his outspoken left-wing politics and notoriously enthusiastic drug use. Even so he refuses to quit the game. The film opens in cinemas and hits VOD on August 19th.
- 6/12/2016
- by Garth Franklin
- Dark Horizons
"Is this what I think it is?" Filmbuff has released a teaer trailer for the baseball drama called Spaceman, about the infamous all-star Mlb pitcher Bill "Spaceman" Lee. Actor Josh Duhamel plays Lee, a former Boston Red Sox and Montreal Expos pitcher who was booted from the Mlb for his love of marijuana and "outspoken politics". The full cast includes Ernie Hudson, W. Earl Brown, Sterling K. Brown, Carlos Leal, Peter Mackenzie and Emma Rose Maloney. This is just the first teaser so it's more of a quick introduction than a full-on trailer, but it looks like it'll be quite fun and funky and full of purple haze. Enjoy. Here's the first official teaser trailer for Brett Rapkin's Spaceman, direct from Filmbuff's YouTube: From the executive producer of Bull Durham and White Men Can't Jump comes the film Spaceman, the mostly-true story of former all-star Mlb pitcher Bill "Spaceman" Lee.
- 6/8/2016
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Emmy-nominated filmmaker Brett Rapkin has teamed up with eight-time NBA All-Star Steve Nash and his Meathawk Productions to fast-track a feature film detailing the brilliant yet tragic life and career of NBA Hall of Famer “Pistol” Pete Maravich, TheWrap has learned. Rapkin recently optioned Maravich’s life rights from his estate under his Podium Pictures banner and has begun writing the screenplay. Nash will produce with Rob Goodrich, Ezra Holland and George Roy. “Pistol” Pete Maravich was a brilliant scorer and playmaker who was pressured by his basketball coach father to become the first million-dollar athlete. During a legendary career playing for.
- 12/9/2015
- by Jeff Sneider
- The Wrap
Exclusive: Josh Duhamel and Ernie Hudson, who last worked together opposite Hilary Swank and Loretta Devine in the ensemble drama You’re Not You from eOne, are coming together again in the baseball drama The Wrong Stuff, based on the bestselling memoir by ex-pitcher Bill “Spaceman” Lee and Richard Lally. The film is being directed by Brett Rapkin and produced by Stephen Nemeth, co-produced by Betsy Stahl and executive produced by Ron Shelton (White Men Can’t Jump) and…...
- 2/28/2015
- Deadline
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