“The Last Dance” director Jason Hehir speaks on Celtics fandom, more

“The Last Dance” director Jason Hehir spoke with Boston Celtics team reporter Marc D’Amico on his fandom for the Cs and much more.

The Boston Celtics might not be prominent in the ESPN Michael Jordan documentary series “The Last Dance” ending tonight with the release of episodes nine and 10, but that doesn’t mean the team hasn’t had a profound impact on the creative mind who guided the series into being.

“The Last Dance” director Jason Hehir recent spoke with Boston team reporter Mark D’Amico in a video produced for the team about his personal Celtics fandom, as well as his general experiences creating the documentary with an eye to where that fandom and the documentary’s production overlapped.

Fans were very nearly without the documentary series as a means for coping with the isolation and lack of sports quarantine in this pandemic necessitates, as it wasn’t quite done.

But, Hehir and his team hunkered down and delivered, making good on delivering the full 10 episodes for fans to see; “As we tape this [interview], we just turned in Episode 10 yesterday,” related Hehir.

“We’re just wild to get this thing done, but it’s been a busy eight weeks in quarantine. I’m actually thankful that I’ve had something to do. I don’t think I’m going through quite the mental anguish that other people are, bouncing off the walls because because I’ve been laser focused every day.”

And the product he and his team created has indeed helped us have something sports-related to channel our own attention towards in the midst of a news cycle and reality that is, otherwise, inescapable.

One of the first instances of the Celtics present in the series was the golfing incident that occurred in between Games 1 and 2 of the first round of the 1986 Eastern Conference Playoffs.

It turned some contemporary heads, as more than a few older players have griped about modern NBA players being too friendly with one another — implying a lack of competitive spirit.

“It didn’t occur to me that there was going to be any sort of backlash because I know that today’s players get a lot of the criticism of [LeBron James’] banana boat and trading jerseys and how it used to be rough and tumble in the 80s and 90s. Guys wouldn’t help each other up off the floor and all that, but I think these players are human beings and and off the court, they left a lot of those things on the floor.”

Such as, by Hehir’s own admission, each other. But, any student of the game of that era will quickly realize Hehir is correct.

While the general vibe of the league was certainly less collegial than it is today, it certainly wasn’t monolithic, and that animosity was — as it is now — usually tied to specific relationships between players with history.

“Some of them carry it over; if you want to talk to the [Chicago] Bulls and the [Detroit] Pistons about that these days, I bet the Celtics and the Lakers probably have something to say about that too,” he added.

“But actually, I just thought it was funny because it speaks to how much Michael was addicted to golf even back then, that he wanted to find a place to play. I think they had two days off — Friday and Saturday — between games one and two, and he wanted to find a place to play.”

Hehir acknowledged Ainge as a pretty significant part of Jordan’s early career,facing him not only in Boston, but also later with the Portland Trail Blazers and the Phoenix Suns.

“[Ainge and MJ] had that altercation they had that fight at half court when Michael stuck his finger in his face and said, ‘Don’t touch me,” he recalled. “Danny was scrappy man.”

The 1986 team in particular was a topic of much conversation, as was the baptism of poor Rick Carlisle by Jordan — then still many years away from his coaching career and a player on Boston’s roster; “I think it was Rick Barry saying that Rick Carlisle wants his mommy,” Hehir noted.

There will evidently be more Celtics connections as well in the final two episodes, as a certain famed forward is due for an appearance.

“You haven’t seen the last of Larry [Bird], because he’s the coach of the [Indiana] Pacers in episode nine when the Bulls face the Pacers in ’98.

“I just thought it was so cool that Larry got to have a little arc in this documentary, because you see him in episode two, facing Michael, … and it was only so significant because he did it against the Celtics. It wasn’t like he just went and did this against a random [Atlanta] Hawks team, it still would have been a record — but to do it against perhaps the best team ever.”

The full interview runs for a little over a half-hour, and is filled with all kinds of details and easter eggs fans of the series will want to catch, so be sure to catch it in its entirety in the video embedded above.

We’re just hours away from the finale of the highly-anticipated series, with episodes nine and ten debuting tonight at 9pm ET.

What we’ll use to fill the basketball-sized holes in hearts afterwards remain to be seen, but until we figure that out, enjoy the last dance of “The Last Dance” this evening.

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