Long after Friday Night Lights took its final bow, a new high school football-focused drama is emerging on the CW. All American brings together Taye Diggs and Daniel Ezra as a coach and player duo who work together to build a better future and a better football experience for Ezra's character of Spencer. As the title suggests, it's a narrative deeply rooted in stories we've seen time and time again in this country, but is All American based on a true story? As it turns out, All American is actually based on the true high school experience of one ex-NFL player. According to the Los Angeles Times, Spencer Paysinger's life serves as inspiration for All American. The show's Spencer transfers from his high school in Crenshaw, Los Angeles to a rich, affluent high school in Beverly Hills. The same thing happened to Paysinger, who the Times reports was raised in a rougher South-Central L.A. neighborhood but played ball at Beverly Hills High School. According to Forbes, Paysinger later spent 7 years in the NFL with stints with the New York Giants, the New York Jets, the Miami Dolphins and the Carolina Panthers, before seemingly putting that on hold in late 2017. Paysinger himself is also very involved in the show, telling a local CBS news affiliate that he was consulting producer over the entire series. "I had the luxury of being a consulting producer to go within the writer’s room a couple days a week and also to be on set as often as I wanted. This is something I’ve wanted to do since retiring from football so I’m soaking up as much as I can and being there as often as I can." He also said that though the show is loosely based on his life, it's not a carbon copy — instead, he gave the people working on the show notes and stories about his experience at large that might help with creating something that resembles his real life. "There are a lot of similarities within the show," he continued in the same interview. "Starting out, creating the pilot everyone will see I gave a lot of stories and memories of my past to the writers to allow them the creative freedom to go and make a compelling story. It’s not 100 percent my story but the bones of it are truly accurate." Diggs' role as Spencer's coach is also based on a real experience, though not exactly one single person — according to the Miami Sun-Sentinel, Paysinger got accepted at his new school because of his talent and the work of his family members at the Beverly Hills institution. "Me and both my brothers got permits to attend Beverly because two of my uncles and my uncle’s wife all taught and coached at Beverly Hills High," he told the outlet. The vastly different backgrounds and worlds of Spencer and his Beverly Hills classmates and teammates serves to be a bit of a study in diversity and how someone's background can affect their personalities and reactions to the world around them. That's also something drawn from real life, and was a purposeful choice for Paysinger and the showrunners. The former football player said in the same interview that he thinks that mixed exposure helped shape him as a person. "I think it gives me a good understanding of different ethnicities, different cultures and respecting them for how they were brought up, and hopefully they respect me and how I was brought up, he said. As Paysinger continues his work on the show, he's got a lifetime of experiences to draw from, and he seems perfectly prepared for the story he wants to tell. This post was originally published on Oct. 10, 2018. It was updated on Aug. 21, 2019.<doc-sep>The CW series All American will feel instantly familiar to anyone who's ever watched The O.C or Friday Night Lights. It will also feel familiar to anyone who's seen one of those heartwarming "troubled black kid from the ghetto with promise" flicks. It perhaps is most familiar to The Blind Side, the 2009 film in which Sandra Bullock adopts a black kid and helps him become an NFL star, which sits at the touchy-feely nexus of both of these templates. As a collage of these touch points, All American mostly works, but it does have a few twists away from the recognizable formula: All American's hero Spencer James (Daniel Ezra) is plucked from South Los Angeles to live with a (mostly) black family in Beverly Hills, but the structural inequality that led Spencer to be marooned on the hard side of town in the first place actually gets addressed. So yes, you've seen All American before, but despite its cliches, the first three episodes The CW sent to us in advance deem All American an engrossing, timely and relevant high school drama with loads of potential. Patrick Wymore/The CW Perhaps not all of All American's predictability was avoidable though, in fairness. Like The Blind Side, All American is based on the true-but-familiar story of a pro athlete, Spencer Paysinger, a former NFL player (Giants, Jets and more) who trekked from South Los Angeles to Beverly Hills to play football as a youth. South Los Angeles, immortalized in Boyz in the Hood and NWA songs, may not be as dangerous today as it's been depicted in the past, but the most glaring problem it faced then and faces now is a lack of options, which All American paints subtly and powerfully. All American Knows It's Friday Nights Lights Meets The O.C. Forget the Beemers and designer clothes the kids in Beverly Hills have: Spencer's neighborhood doesn't have movie theaters or Whole Foods stores, or summer jobs and internships at tech companies. Athletics really is one of the only proven, viable routes out of his neighborhood, where gangs bloom amid decay. So when Spencer is scouted by Coach Billy Baker (Taye Diggs) to go to Beverly Hills High for a shot at a better future, there's little doubt, besides Spencer's initial resistance (because that's how it goes in these stories), he'll end up there. His hardworking, respectable single mom Grace (Karimah Westbrook) backs him, and he's shipped off to a new, almost entirely white school that's only 15 miles away but a galaxy apart. Daniel Ezra as Spencer James, All American Ray Mickshaw/The CW Almost everything that happens next -- Spencer encounters hazing from his teammates, Spencer deals with racism, Spencer struggles to adapt, Spencer likes girls out of his league -- comes as surely as the next crosstown bus, or more to the point, the next scene in the football show or movie you've already seen. But All American is baked in truth, and the truth is kids like Spencer are less likely to graduate, almost four times as likely to live in poverty and almost 20 times as likely to be incarcerated as the kids in Beverly Hills. Apparently this story needs to be retold over and over for Americans to see and fix the real odds Spencer faces, and one of the things All American does well is make viewers live in this disparity in a way that doesn't seem exploitative and cheap. Better still, All American upends the notion that a "golden ticket out of the ghetto" fantasy is a coveted prize. Instead, All American shows the complexity and beauty in the underserved community too, since Spencer sojourns back home often. All American Ray Mickshaw/The CW One way it does this especially well is through the eyes of Spencer's best friend Tiana "Coop" Cooper, played by Empire's Bre-Z. With one foot in the street life and the other guiding Spencer's steps, she's a moral guide and also openly gay -- or, at least, openly gay with her friends. Her story about reconciling her sexuality with her religious family dynamics (her mom is a preacher) becomes significant, and another fresh, poignant point of distinction from All American's influences. Bre-Z, slightly unbelievable as a teenager (sorry Bre-Z), is nevertheless a solid performer with depth; Daniel Ezra is outstanding, both in the show's beautiful football scenes and off the field, even if the script has him going to near-nuclear levels of violent anger for even the slightest provocations. The Angry Black Guy is another of All American's redundancies but then, Spencer has plenty to be angry about and when he blows up, you feel for the kid. Spencer is as American as the rich (mostly white) kids he's now colleagues with, but the injustices life handed him simply for being born give All American juicy dramatic meat to bite into. Taye Diggs, All American Eddy Chen/The CW There's another whopper of a distinction between All American and its forefathers and this is the big one: Billy, the man who brings Spencer into his home, is probably the father who abandoned him in the first place. That's the clear, blatantly obvious mystery that (sorry for spoiling it!) is discernible by end of the first episode. How All American plans to extend that thinly masked puzzle remains to be seen. Fortunately, there's enough else going on -- what with Spencer's school life, dealing with Coach Baker's son (and likely half-brother) Jordan (Michael Evans Behling), as well as Spencer's dramas back in his old neighborhood -- to make All American work once that "I am your father!" thing inevitably runs its course. Here's the thing though: the real Spencer, unlike CW Spencer, apparently had male role models -- his uncles and his dad played football at Beverly High. Knowing that makes All American's decision to go down the "absent father, struggling single mother" road a clear and deliberate choice, one that repurposes a myth about black life we've seen 1,000 already, a myth not even true to the source material. Perhaps that's inconsequential: On the whole, All American scores big as a tale about flying high while staying true to your roots, and it's a needed entry into the high school football drama genre. When it breaks free from well-worn plays we've already seen -- especially cliches and easy stereotypes -- it just might soar. All American premieres Wednesday, Oct. 10 at 9/8c on The CW. (Full Disclosure: TV Guide is owned by CBS, The CW's parent company.)<doc-sep>Fish out of water stories are pretty good TV fodder, especially when it comes to high school-oriented shows. But just because we’ve seen a premise before doesn’t mean that a good script and charming lead can’t make it fly. All American, a new CW show, has both and the Greg Berlanti stamp of approval. Read on to find out about a show that’s a little bit beyond the usual… ALL AMERICAN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT? Opening Shot: A shot of downtown Los Angeles, then a flash of a copter light sends us to the field of South Crenshaw High School, where Spencer James (Daniel Ezra) is dominating a game as the star wide receiver. The Gist: Right after South Crenshaw wins the game, a car drives by and opens fire. It’s not exactly a rare occurrence in the Crenshaw district of L.A., and it’s one of the reasons why Beverly High School coach Billy Baker (Taye Diggs) is at the game; he wants to recruit Spencer to play for him. When he proposes it to Spencer after the game, saying he can get around the recruiting restrictions and transfer rules, Spencer still turns him down, figuring he’s doing just fine where he is. But after he gets into a fight at school defending his best friend Coop (Bre-Z), he comes home to see Coach Baker talking to his mother Grace (Karimah Westbrook). Grace knows that going to Beverly High isn’t just a path to the NFL (Coach Baker is a former NFL player, so he has connections) but a way out of a bad path he’s setting for himself in Crenshaw, despite being a good student. At Beverly High, he meets Coach Baker’s son Jordan (Michael Evans Behling), the team’s quarterback who is suspicious of the reasons why Spencer is there. He also meets Jordan’s sister Olivia (Samantha Logan), who’s become a social outcast since leaving rehab. He also meets the most popular girl in school, Leila Faisal (Greta Onieogou), who takes a liking to him despite dating Asher (Cody Christian), who is currently Beverly High’s star wide receiver. Coach Baker moves Spencer to cornerback; he has his reasons but Spencer just wants to catch passes. Also, Jordan and Asher scheme to get Spencer kicked off the team, especially after Jordan finds out that the real reason why his dad recruited Spencer is to give the team a better chance of winning so he can keep his job. When an anonymous tip came in that Spencer is a transfer that was recruited, Coach Baker offers a room at his house for Spencer to live in. His mother reluctantly agrees, but there’s also another reason why she wants Spencer to live with Baker and his family. Our Take: All American comes from the Greg Berlanti drama factory — it’s created by April Blair (YOU) — and has all the hallmarks of a CW teen show: Pretty people, a loud soundtrack, lots of sexy times and high school drama. But there’s definitely more to it than that, and a lot of it comes down to the charm of Daniel Ezra as Spencer. Spencer is one of the more fully-realized lead characters we’ve seen in any high school-sports-related series. He’s confident in his abilities, to he borderline of cockiness, but he’s also smart and knows that he can hold his own in Crenshaw, despite the odds being stacked against him. Spencer grew up without his father, who left to coach in the pros, and Ezra does a good job at portraying the simmering anger at his dad that drives him. When Spencer gets to Beverly High, he persists in making himself known there despite having a completely different background from everyone else at the school. And Ezra projects Spencer’s confidence well. Diggs is also fine as the conflicted Coach Baker, who really wants to give Spencer a leg up, but wants to win most of all. The teen drama needs to be there, of course, with Jordan being jealous of the attention his dad gives Spencer, and Olivia pining for Spencer even though he has eyes for Leila. But there’s more to the show than that, and we hope Blair can get past the good kids-bad kids dynamic and really dig into the fact that Spencer’s loyalties are split between two different worlds. Sex and Skin: Nothing so far. Parting Shot: Coach Baker shows up at Grace’s door. We’d tell you what he was there for, but that would spoil an interesting twist. Bre-Z is great as Coop (full name Tiana Cooper) who, despite the fact that she has had to deal with being bullied for being gay, is confident enough to encourage Spencer to keep going at Beverly, despite the fact that she’s going to lose her closest friend and protector. Most Pilot-y Line: Jordan drives Spencer to his house to hang at the pool with his buddies. When he tells his mother Laura (Monet Mazur) “We’re gonna hit it,” she says, “You do that… whatever that is.” Oh, Laura, you’re oh so white, aren’t you? Our Call: STREAM IT. There’s a great drama under the teenage BS, and Ezra’s presence makes you want to keep watching Spencer’s journey unfold. Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere. Watch All American on The CW<doc-sep>
Watching "All American," CW's new teen drama, you might flash back to a bygone era when high-school series treated every hookup and breakup like life and death, gossip was practically a sport and conflicts were resolved with a little teamwork on the basketball court or football field. There haven't been many shows in the vein of "The O.C.," "One Tree Hill" or "90210" in recent years; instead, "Riverdale" and "Pretty Little Liars" opted for truly life-and-death stakes, with murder mysteries and bloody cliffhangers. But CW has recaptured that early 2000s spirit with "All American," a good, old-fashioned high-school show that's perhaps a little too reminiscent of "O.C.," but also makes that familiar formula work. It doesn't need an ax-murderer to add drama; there's plenty already. Created by April Blair ("Reign"), "All American" (Wednesday, 9 ET/PT, ★★★ out of four), based on the life of former NFL player Spencer Paysinger, follows Spencer James (Daniel Ezra), a football star living in the Crenshaw neighborhood of Los Angeles, who dreams of playing for the NFL. His fairy godfather appears in the form of Billy Baker (Taye Diggs), who coaches at Beverly Hills High and wants to take Spencer away from his underfunded school and the violence in his neighborhood (we told you it was just like "The O.C."). He offers Spencer a spot on his team and promises that with an elite school on his resume, he'll have a far easier time going pro. The transition from Crenshaw to Beverly Hills isn't all daisies and sing-a-longs, as Spencer and his classmates each go through culture shock. He feels disconnected from the rich, mostly white, students and teammates who bring laptops to school and spend afternoons partying on the beach. They see him as a threat, both on and off the field, to the privileged status quo they've worked hard to achieve. More:Former NFL star Spencer Paysinger, and how CW's buzzy 'All American' is unlike 'The O.C.' If the setup sounds familiar, "All American" quickly reveals itself as more nuanced than a standard fish-out-of-water story. Spencer's disdain for his teammates rises to a sense of superiority, because he had to work harder to get there and will suffer more from the team's failure. The writers refrain from painting the rich kids with the same, spoiled brush. One of Spencer's rivals-turned-maybe-friends is Jordan (Michael Evans Behling), Coach Billy's biracial son, who resents Spencer's chummy relationship with his dad. "American" works because the writers often push its predictable plot lines further than you'd expect. When the police pull over Spencer and Jordan, it's not just about clashes between law enforcement and the black community; the series examines Jordan's biracial identity and how that affects his relationship with his father. Once the series establishes Spencer in Beverly Hills, the writers don't depend on him for every plot, creating a rich supporting cast around him with their own resonant story lines. Spencer's best friend Coop (Bre-Z), an out lesbian struggling to navigate Crenshaw without Spencer's protection, is easily the show's most engrossing and unique character. The casting is excellent, and Ezra is a brilliant find as a relatively unknown British actor (not that you'd know: his American accent is impeccable). Watching him is akin to seeing Michael B. Jordan in "Friday Night Lights" – it's clear he's a star in the making, all charming smiles and furrowed brows. Diggs adds familiarity and charm as the insecure coach whose white wife out-earns him, who measures his self-worth by the success of the Beverly football team. There's certainly room for "American" to grow, particularly among its female high-school characters who are, at least in the first three episodes made available for review, largely defined by their romantic interests. Still, "All American" is fun, melodramatic and watchable. It's easy to see how much its writers love the genre, and how good they are at working in it. Watching "American" is like a class reunion: Comforting and nostalgic, but with a few surprises tucked up its sleeve. It's the kind of show that's easy to cheer for, even if its football team isn't that great yet.