TV Talk: Curiosity Stream turns ‘Spotlight’ on Beaver Falls native Joe Namath

Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week.

Nonfiction streaming service Curiosity Stream goes “Beyond the Spotlight” for an episode dedicated to Beaver Falls native Joe Namath.

Now streaming, “Beyond the Spotlight” debuted this fall with three episodes about celebrities who are trying to make a difference, including Namath and actor LeVar Burton (“Roots,” “Reading Rainbow,” “Star Trek: The Next Generation”).

Since the 2012 documentary “Namath,” the NFL legend has started a charity, The Joe Namath Foundation, and he underwent treatment for concussions.

“Beyond the Spotlight,” executive produced by Leonardo DiCaprio through his production company Appian Way, details Namath’s formative years in Beaver Falls, playing football and baseball and encountering racial prejudice when at a pizza place with his Black neighbor and childhood friend Lynwood Alford.

“You’re not born with prejudice. You’re not born with hatred. These things are taught,” Alford says in the documentary. “Joe was never taught that.”

The film’s thesis statement is found in Namath’s own words: “They talk about teamwork in sports. Excuse me, the biggest game of all — life — is teamwork. We need one another.”

Namath, now 78 and living in Florida near a daughter and his grandchildren, said he agreed to participate in the documentary as a way to raise awareness about his charitable foundation, which grew out of his work with the March of Dimes.

“It all goes back to my Beaver Falls days,” Namath said in a recent phone interview. “We had those little cardboard posters that our parents gave us and told us to help out – this was before Dr. Salk had come up with the [polio] vaccine – and we were collecting dimes, walking around in front of Five and Ten [stores], sticking the cards out for adults to help out the March of Dimes.”

Namath founded his charity in 2017 with a focus on children’s charities and neurological research.

“If you live long enough, if you’re guided in the right direction and lucky enough, you learn that your health is very important. It’s often taken for granted,” Namath said. “We need to take care of ourselves and always, always starting at home and thinking about and helping those that need some help, just having an honest-to-God basic respect for other people and caring about them.”

Given where he grew up, I wondered if Namath ever dreamed of playing for the Steelers. He said while he pulled for the Steelers first and foremost among NFL teams growing up, he never dared dream of playing for the hometown team.

“We never thought about having choices. We really didn’t,” he said, comparing the TV environment of his youth (three networks) to today (hundreds of cable and streaming options). “Sometimes you didn’t have a choice or didn’t think you did and that brings me up to this current day and age. It is mindboggling to me why more people haven’t taken the vaccine for covid, if not just for themselves, for the rest of the world, for the rest of the people [they come in contact with]. Come on!”

For Namath, it all comes down to teamwork.