The Making of "Slap Shot"

"The Making of Slap Shot,"
available on Amazon and most
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With the NHL hockey teams now back on the ice, it may be time to remember the most notorious hockey team ever captured on film.

Unlike the Flyers or Bruins, this team made its home in the fictional city of Charlestown, and didn’t have the perks awarded to the skaters gunning for the Stanley Cup. But I can guarantee that every NHL player on the ice knows the story of the Chiefs. Why? Because “Slap Shot” has been a fixture showing on the team bus of every minor league hockey team for the past 35 years.

Its notoriety is timeless. In today’s Yahoo! Sports, writer Michael Silver listed his “Baker’s Dozen” of sports sibling combinations. His original point was to show that the Harbaugh brothers are not the most famous. In his opinion (a valid one) the Williams sisters are.

But it was his last paragraph that caught my attention. To make the “Baker’s Dozen,” Wetzel had to throw in a 13^th entry. His choice – the fictional Hanson brothers, from “Slap Shot.”

In my humble opinion, the movie, penned by a woman (didya know that?), Nancy Dowd, is the funniest picture ever made. Its mixture of humor and violence, set in a world of lower income desperation, brings the world of minor league hockey front and center to the viewer.

Jonathon Jackson has produced a first rate book on
"The Making of Slap Shot," one of the greatest, and
arguably, the funniest sports movie ever made

Paul Newman starred as the player/coach Reggie Dunlop. In his role, he makes a conscious decision to turn his ragtag bunch of Chiefs into a contender. Knowing that the town mill is about to fold, which will mean the demise of the team, Dunlop decides to make a spectacle of his team, hoping that large crowds at the War Memorial will keep them in business. Before long, the skittish Chiefs are quick to drop the gloves, resulting in some hysterical scenes, both on and off the ice. The opening scene introducing the Hanson’s is three minutes of unadultered,  laugh-out-loud fun.

In later life, Newman said that Dunlop was one of his favorite roles, although he realized he may have taken his role too seriously while sitting at the dinner table at home one evening. In need of a certain spice, he gnarled at his daughter to “Pass the f---in‘ salt!”

One of the most remarkable facts about “Slap Shot” is that, aside from a handful of actors, most notably Newman, but including Michael Ontkean (“The Rookies”), Strother Martin (“what I see here is a failure to communicate”), and M. Emmet Walsh, most of the stars of the film were actually minor league hockey players. Even Ontkean had some background, having played hockey for three years at the University of New Hampshire. And why not? Who else could pull off the skating and hockey moves? The making of the movie is as fascinating as the storyline itself.

Jonathon Jackson has written a must read book – “The Making of Slap Shot,” which captures every nuance behind the filming of this 1977 classic. His story goes deep, from Dowd’s stories of listening to her brother Ned (Ogie Ogilthorpe in the movie) telling his tales of life on the road with the Johnstown Jets to casting, filming to even deeper background material, such as the story of Bill “Goldie” Goldthorpe, the real life Ogie.

Jackson was a fan of the movie, and it was that connection which got him started. "I got the idea for the book when i attended a cast reunion, intending to write a magazine article. I realized that there was much more to the story than i would ever be able to fit into a single article. Once I started tracking down other cast members and people who had been part of the film, it snowballed very quickly."

It is amazing to learn some of the names behind the story. In fact, one of the best stories in "Making" tells of Goldthorpe playing for the Syracuse Blazers in 1973 and immediately developing a hatred for their young announcer, a recent Syracuse U. grad named Bob Costas. To quote Jackson’s version:

“He (Goldthorpe) also developed a dislike for Blazers play-by-play broadcaster Bob Costas, leading to a frightening incident on the team bus. As Costas recalls it, he was reading the New York Times when Goldthorpe grabbed the newspaper, tore it to shreds and showered Costas with the pieces. Costas, youthfully stupid, responded by telling the player he would teach him how to read. Goldthorpe had to be restrained by teammates from doing to Costas what he had already done to the newspaper.”

There’s plenty more, as many of the characters were inspired by real life minor league players, coaches and announcers. For example, “Slap Shot” announcer “Jim Carr” was patterned after Bill Wilson, Johnstown announcer with a ‘sensationally ugly” toupee.

The book is a must read for all “Slap Shot” fans – heck, for all hockey fans. It’s view of the minor league hockey life is gritty and unencumbered. There were sure some characters back in the day, and Jackson manages to “capture the spirit of the thing!”