'The Paterno Legacy' Saves Its Biggest Revelation for the End
The most compelling revelation of ESPN’s “The Paterno Legacy” arrives at the end, in the form of a statement from Penn State. It serves as the university’s declaration of closure, a coda that will satisfy some and enrage others.
“Regarding Coach Paterno,” Penn State says, “there are no plans for additional honors or a reinstallation of the statue.”
Paterno’s place in Penn State’s current ecosystem is an intriguing subplot of “The Paterno Legacy,” which airs April 18 (8 p.m. EST) on ESPN. The one-hour documentary offers voices from the past, including those of Jerry Sandusky and Paterno himself in flashback interviews, and commentary that considers Paterno’s triumphs and flaws.
What’s noticeably missing is Penn State’s current perspective on Paterno, at least until that statement. The documentary includes some beautiful campus drone shots, interviews with a few students and an uncomfortable exchange between an ESPN crew and coach James Franklin at a post-practice media availability last November. Aside from its statement, and an interview with a professor, the university remains silent, which speaks volumes and ultimately is understandable.
At this point, 10 years on, with its second head football coach and third president of the post-Paterno era, Penn State likely considers its interests best served by letting the past rest. Again, a choice that will satisfy some and enrage others. Note that four candidates running for alumni seats on Penn State's Board of Trustees say the university should recognize Paterno's legacy.
Meanwhile, "The Paterno Legacy” is neither a hit piece nor an attempt at reclamation. It is a rather quiet, contemplative piece — aside from several shots of a shower evoking the movie “Psycho” — that covers plenty of decade-old ground before getting to its title.
The film extensively revisits the events of 2011 and 2012, when Paterno won his record 409th career game, was fired 11 days later, was hospitalized during Penn State’s first game in 61 years without him and then died of lung cancer — all in less than three months.
It includes rare interviews with Graham Spanier, the former Penn State president who wears an ankle monitor following his two-month 2021 prison sentence, and former vice president Gary Schultz, who also went to prison. Neither sheds much light on his role in Penn State’s Sandusky investigation, though Schultz does describe his “biggest regret.”
“The Paterno Legacy” recalls the July 2012 day when a university crew removed the Paterno statue from outside Beaver Stadium, which Spanier calls a “big mistake.” It gives voice to Louis Freeh’s investigation that led to the NCAA sanctions against Penn State and the report the Paterno family commissioned in response. The documentary does not delve into the merits of either, allowing each position to stand on its own.
The two most striking voices of “The Paterno Legacy” belong to Aaron Fisher, known as Victim 1 in Sandusky’s 2012 trial, and to Sandusky himself. Fisher, who wrote the book “Silent No More,” describes attempting suicide after Sandusky’s abuse. Sandusky maintains his innocence. ESPN asks both about Paterno's legacy.
“The best thing that I can do for Joe Paterno’s legacy is to demonstrate how he should’ve been exonerated,” Sandusky says from prison. “And the only way he can get exonerated is if I’m exonerated.”
“The Paterno Legacy” arrives as ESPN examines Paterno’s legacy from another perspective. ESPN recently published a lengthy, meticulously reported piece about Todd Hodne, a Penn State football player in the 1970s who was convicted of rape and murder and who died in a hospital prison ward in 2020.
For many people, these pieces of content are entirely unrelated, as is Paterno's connection to Hodne's crimes. For others, they’re inescapably intertwined. Time hasn’t changed those positions.
“We don’t do legacy very well when there are dark sides to legacies,” Mark Dyreson, director of research and educational programs for the Penn State Center for the Study of Sports in Society, tells ESPN.
Ten years later, “The Paterno Legacy” underscores the complicated nature of legacy.
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