Mary Lou Retton by Diane Johnson/ WireImage.com
Bud Greenspan has made a career of turning the camera on athletes, but tonight ESPN takes a look at the acclaimed sports documentarian himself. Bud Greenspan: At the Heart of the Games (Tuesday, May 6, 9 pm/ET, ESPN2) chronicles a career best known for the inspiring-without-being-too-schmalzy Sixteen Days of Glory Olympic-recap films.
“When we talk about Olympic filmmaking, if there’s a Mount Rushmore, Bud’s head is the only one on it," says NBC's longtime Olympic host Bob Costas, who gives one of many testimonials in the film. Also interviewed are gymnast Mary Lou Retton, figure skater Brian Boitano and speed skater Bonnie Blair, all of whom were featured in Greenspan films.
Greenspan and his army of filmmakers exhaustively trail an athlete, finding a way to gain intimate access, even within the mayhem of an Olympic venue. “One of Bud’s great skills, and he does it in victory and in defeat, is putting it into perspective without overdramatizing things," says Dave Moorcroft, whose agonizing run at the 1984 Los Angeles Games was touchingly told by Greenspan. (The world-record holder in the 5000-meter run at the time, Moorcroft was fighting injury in the finals of that event as he valiantly fought to avoid being lapped by the race leaders.)
The man ESPN's Rick Reilly calls "Kojak with a great eye," is now 81 and still making movies, but his legacy is already secure. Says U.S. Olympic Committee chairman Peter Ueberroth, who ran the Los Angeles organizing committee in '84: “He’s done a service for the Olympic movement that he’ll never be properly thanked for, because… the brand 'Olympics' is what Bud has made for the world.”
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