| Director: | Ernest Dickerson |
| Starring: | John Turturro John Heard Kevin Anderson Nicholas Turturro Brad Beyer Patti Lupone Eli Wallach |
| Composer: | Grant Geissman Van Dyke Parks |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
| Executive Producer: | Leslie Greif Lewis Kleinberg |
| Producer: | Tiffany McLinn Lore |
| Runtime: | 98 minutes |
| Network: | TNT |
Monday Night Mayhem is a 2002 television film about the origin of ABC's television series Monday Night Football. It debuted on the U.S. cable TV network TNT on January 14, 2002. It was based on the 1988 nonfiction book of the same title by Marc Gunther and Bill Carter.
Filming took place in New York, New Jersey, and other locations by Turner Network Television.[1]
Phil Gallo of Variety complained that "nobody looks quite right" and "there is invariably a thin line between caricature and character."[1]
Larry Stewart of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a negative review, writing, "The book was good, the movie isn’t. It appears to be cheaply made and the characters, particularly Frank Gifford and Don Meredith, are not believable. John Turturro does a decent job portraying Cosell, but his performance isn’t enough to save the movie." Stewart concludes, "It doesn’t come close to matching a documentary HBO did a couple of years ago titled “Cosell.”"[2]
Allen Barra of The New York Times gave the film a more positive review, writing that the film "works because of Mr. Turturro's unabashed joy in playing a part as juicy as Howard Cosell."[3]
In the same year, Jon Voight portrayed Howard Cosell in the Michael Mann biopic Ali (2001). Voight's performance earned him an Academy Award nomination.
The movie was released on VHS on September 10, 2002.[4]