NEW YORK (OSV News) – In 2024, the Boston Celtics won their 18th NBA championship. In the wake of that record-breaking achievement, HBO has produced “Celtics City,” a nine-hour documentary series that provides an exhaustive deep dive into the storied history of the franchise.
Currently streaming on HBO Max, the program is sweeping in its coverage of the Celtics’ string of interlocking successes. More significantly, however, filmmaker Lauren Stowell’s retrospective artfully uses the Celtics as a lens through which to view the backdrop of Boston as a whole, particularly the city’s turbulent past where race relations were concerned.
A positive moment in that often bitter saga involved actor Donnie Wahlberg. Scion of a family with a high profile in Catholic circles, Wahlberg gave voice to the better angels of his hometown in a pivotal effort at outreach.
In 2016, the Celtics had just drafted high school standout Jaylen Brown. But the selection of the African American player was greeted with boos rather than cheers. This seemed to confirm Beantown’s reputation as a racially hostile environment.
As Brown recounts on screen, Wahlberg responded by reaching out to him and saying, “I apologize on behalf of the city, and I would like to welcome you.”
“I just thought that was a very kind thing to do,” Brown — who has since become one of the Celtics’ most valuable players — observes.
Yet, ironically, by the time Brown joined the squad, the Celtics had been benefiting from a policy of inclusion for decades. This was largely the work of their legendary general manager, Red Auerbach.
Shortly after becoming the Celtics’ coach in 1950, Auerbach had helped pioneer a colorblind approach to the sport by drafting Chuck Cooper, one of the three African American players who entered the NBA that season, thus breaking down basketball’s longstanding color barrier.
At the other end of his coaching career, in 1966, Auerbach made history again by appointing future Hall of Famer Bill Russell as his successor. Russell thus became the first African American to be head coach of a team, not only in basketball but in any major U.S. sport.
Russell was known for his consistently outspoken approach to racial politics. That placed him at odds with those resisting integration.
Amid a host of commentators on the various eras of the team and the changing cultural climate of Boston, the R&B/hip-hop/new jack swing musical trio Bell Biv DeVoe stands out as a striking presence. Sporting leather Celtics jackets, the Boston natives ruminate on various contradictions that illuminate the complex relationship between the fans and their team.
Some of those paradoxes have been the result of tragedy. When University of Maryland star Len Bias, the Celtics top draft pick in 1986, died of a cocaine overdose just days after his selection, his entire life was quickly reduced to nothing more than a cautionary tale. Auerbach, however, was having none of it.
Archival footage shows Auerbach being asked if one result of Bias’ death shouldn’t be the establishment of pre-draft background checks. Thereupon he raises his chin in the air and, with his famous cigar in hand, declares in his punchy cadence, “What more background check on a guy would you know than what you see and what you feel?”
“I’ve been with the guy,” Auerbach continues, “I know the guy. It’s like Larry Bird. We didn’t check Larry Bird. We knew what kind of guy Larry Bird was.”
Then, awarding Bias perhaps the ultimate accolade, Auerbach declares, “He was a Celtics-type kid in every essence.” With those remarks, Auerbach was not only defending the deceased player’s memory but his human dignity as well.
A certain air of bravado sometimes taints the narrative tone and the use of some locker room language puts the show out of bounds for kids. But grown TV fans will find “Celtics City” an intriguing study of the way in which a popular sports team can bring healing to an entire city.
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