Brian's Song is a 1971 TV movie, recalling the details of the life of Brian Piccolo (played by James Caan), a white football player stricken with terminal cancer, and his friendship with black Chicago Bears running back teammate and Pro Football Hall of Famer Gale Sayers (Billy Dee Williams), who helps him through the difficult struggle. The true story was such a success on ABC television (November 30, 1971) that it was later shown in theaters. S...
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Brian's Song is a 1971 TV movie, recalling the details of the life of Brian Piccolo (played by James Caan), a white football player stricken with terminal cancer, and his friendship with black Chicago Bears running back teammate and Pro Football Hall of Famer Gale Sayers (Billy Dee Williams), who helps him through the difficult struggle. The true story was such a success on ABC television (November 30, 1971) that it was later shown in theaters. Some critics have called the movie among the finest telefilms ever made.
The movie is based on Sayers' account of his friendship with Piccolo and Piccolo's illness in Sayers' autobiography, I Am Third. The film was written by veteran screenwriter William Blinn, whose script one Dallas television critic called "highly restrained, steering clear of any overt sentimentality [yet conveying] the genuine affection the two men felt so deeply for each other."
The musical theme to Brian's Song, "The Hands of Time," was a popular tune during the early...
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