With all of the talk in the sports world centering around “dynasties” after Kansas City’s third Super Bowl win in five years, it’s somewhat fitting that the first installments of Matthew Hamachek’s The Dynasty: New England Patriots are hitting Apple TV+ on Friday (February 16) to remind us exactly what a proper dynasty looks like.
Known for docs like Netflix’s Amanda Knox and HBO’s Tiger, Hamachek’s 10-part docu-series covers the entirety of the Brady-Belichick era, featuring interviews with dozens of former players and staff, and gives us an inside look at one of the longest-lasting collaborations in sports. And now that it’s all over – fully and completely, now that Belichick is no longer on staff – it offers a retrospective look at just how difficult it was to accomplish such a feat. Six Lombardi trophies are nothing to sneeze at, after all.
Vanyaland spoke to Hamachek on a particularly busy virtual press day, and though we didn’t get to ask all the questions we wanted, we had a lovely conversation about the infamous reputation of the Pats around the country, the large scale and wide scope of the project, and how people can bypass “We’re on to Cincinnati” when talking with one of the greatest coaches of all time.
Vanyaland: I think a good place to start is probably this: You’ve made a number of excellent documentaries about infamous, enigmatic, and misunderstood figures. And do you see this story as a continuation of that theme?
Matthew Hamachek: I’ve made all sorts of stories about different people, and I think, look, most of the time when you’re making a documentary, you’re taking really small stories that people haven’t really heard about before, and you’re presenting them as really big stories where the drama is heightened, and you’re taking stories about people that you’ve really never heard about before, and you’re making them into larger-than-life stories. Some of them, and I think Dynasty is one of those, is where you get people that have been built up into godlike figures. We’re talking about people [who] are called the greatest of all time.
And what was so fun about this one is you have the opportunity to show why they’re human beings just like us. And they might be doing it on the biggest stage imaginable, but they are going through very human stories, and it’s really about how people interact with each other. And I think what that allows you to do is to tell a story that, yes, if you’re the most die-hard of die-hard New England Patriot fans, there will be tons of things in here that you’ve never heard of before. But at the same time, if you could care less about football or you hate the Patriots or whatever it is, those human stories are what makes everything great, and I think everybody will have something to take away from this.
Absolutely. I imagine it’s kind of like watching The Last Dance if you’re a Utah Jazz fan. [both laugh] You still find something good in there to enjoy. And about that, I think it’s interesting you have such huge rosters in the NFL. Not only do you have the 53-man, but you’ve got the practice squads. You’ve got everything else along those lines, and they’re always constantly changing. How do you depict, I think, the glue that holds a team together or an organization together across the better part of 15-something, 20 years, I’d say?
Right. Look, it’s like you said, it’s a 20-year story, and the intention when I started this thing for Apple TV Plus and Imagine Entertainment was to be able to tell a story that arcs over 20 years. It isn’t going to be a thing where episode one is an island unto itself, and then episode two is about something completely different. It was a large, arcing story. And what you find are these three characters at the top of this thing, starting with Robert Kraft, who had to leverage everything he had to be able to buy the team in the first place. You have Bill Belichick who, according to the people we talked to, had an underwhelming stint as a head coach in Cleveland, Tom Brady, who was the 199th pick in the draft.
These unlikely three come together. And along with the 60, 70 people, players we talked to, coaches, executives, et cetera on the team, they create this rare thing in sports, but also in life in general, where a group of people puts aside the messiness of being a human being, the messiness of human relationships, things like ego and taking credit and all of these things, and they say, “Look, we have a common goal here. We’re going to be totally selfless, and we’re going to go together towards this common goal of winning a Super Bowl.” They do that, then they win two more. They have three and four years at the beginning of this thing.
And then I think, when we talk about the arc of this story, I think of that part of it as almost like it’s a roller coaster ride, and you’re getting pulled up to the top. And right when they get that third Super Bowl in four years, you’re peering over the edge, and you’re about to start to go on this incredible ride, where the next episode is about the Spygate scandal and all of that. And then they sustain and keep these messy things at bay for a very, very long time, but nothing lasts forever. And eventually, the normal human condition starts to creep its way into this building that had kept it out for so long. And so it’s an incredible, big story, but it’s definitely about the people who are there.
Just have one final question for you: On behalf of the New England Press, how do you get a good answer out of Bill Belichick?
[laughs] Look, you just ask people questions, and it’s not more complicated than that. I was not a Patriot fan growing up. I like to listen to what people have to say, and I actually interviewed Bill towards the end of the process. And so I think one of the benefits that I had is I had talked to 60 or so people that had played for him, who had coached alongside him, and I think we knew a lot, and so we were able to ask very specific questions. And look, Bill gave some great answers, and I think that people will find everybody in this story a bit different than the way that they think they are because we really had the opportunity to tell this in an incredibly complex and nuanced way.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.