Remembering The Titans (con't)

Was the racial tension in the community depicted accurately in the film?
No. Although racial tension did exist in Alexandria, Virginia in 1971, it was significantly embellished for the movie. For example, T.C. Williams High School saw the integration of black and white students when it opened in the fall of 1965, not in 1971. Former students state that many of the racial barriers had been broken down by 1971, when federal pressure resulted in the consolidation of three high schools, one of which was T.C. Williams. In an interview with the Greenville News, the real Ronnie "Sunshine" Bass said, "They (the movie) had a community divided down black and white, and it really wasn't like that in 1971 Alexandria." In a Washington Post article, Bill Yoast's friend Patrick Welsh commented on the movie's position, "My friend Bill Yoast ... told me Disney had taken liberties with the facts, suggesting an overheated atmosphere of racial animosities and fears at the school and in the community that just hadn't existed." Yet, it was clear that the Titans championship run did help the community to further come together.
-ESPN.com

Before the first game, Herman Boone (Denzel Washington) tells his players, "Like all the other schools in this conference, they're all white. They don't have to worry about race. We do."
In reality, all of the other schools that the Titans faced during the 1971 season were integrated schools. -ESPN.com

Did Coach Herman Boone really toss a banana to rival Coach Tyrell at the end of a game?
No. This scene was fictionalized for the movie, as was Coach Tyrell (Brett Rice).

Did a plot really exist with the referees to ensure that the Titans would lose a game?
No. In the movie Remember the Titans, we see Coach Yoast (Will Patton) confront a crooked referee, telling him to call the game fairly or else he'll expose the whole plot to make the Titans lose the game, resulting in the firing of Coach Boone. Coach Yoast also tells the ref that he'll personally see to it that the ref never works again. This incident never really happened. The real Coach Herman Boone referred to it in the DVD Commentary by saying, "We got our share of bad calls, and I'm not sure, to this day, that some of it was not racism," Boone says. "But it was not as overt as appears in the film."

Is the part in the movie about Coach Bill Yoast not making the Virginia High School Hall of Fame true?
No. There was no Virginia High School Hall of Fame in 1971, although it does exist today.

Was Coach Yoast's daughter Sheryl really a football fanatic like she was portrayed to be in the film?
Sheryl wasn't as deeply intense about football as the film depicts. "She was not quite the football fanatic they show here," says father Bill Yoast. "(But) she was at all the ballgames, watched them and ... was always the first on the field after the ballgame."
-Remember the Titans DVD Commentary

Did Coach Yoast's daughter Sheryl really go over to Coach Boone's house to play with his daughter?
No. In the movie we see Bill Yoast take his daughter Sheryl Yoast to Herman Boone's house to play with Boone's daughter. Sheryl ends up watching game films with Boone instead. In reality, this never happened. Boone said the following on the Remember the Titans DVD commentary, "Sheryl never visited my home. I wish she had spent any time with my children. Unfortunately, that didn't happen."

In real life, was Sheryl Yoast really an only child who lived with her father?
No. Unlike in the film, the real Sheryl Yoast had three sisters and lived with her mother. Bill Yoast did convey to producer Jerry Bruckheimer that he wasn't happy about this. "I said, 'I have four daughters. I don't like to look like I only have one daughter,'" says Yoast of his conversation with Bruckheimer. Sheryl's three sisters, however, were okay with the storyline, which was part of the reason it made it into the film (ESPN.com). In 1996, the real Sheryl Yoast passed away from a heart condition that had gone undetected for years. She was not alive when the movie was made.

Did the racial incident in the restaurant actually happen?
No. In the film we see Petey Jones (Donald Faison) and Ronnie Bass (Kip Pardue) enter a restaurant where they are refused service. As reported on the '71 Titans Web Site, this did not actually happen. Even though the attitude portrayed by the restaurant may have been similar to existing establishments in the United States at that time, this scene was a fictional device created to help emphasize the racial tension in the movie's storyline.

Did someone really throw a brick through Coach Herman Boone's window?
No, it was actually much worse than a brick. It was a toilet commode. Boone spoke about this durning the Remember the Titans DVD commentary, "There wasn't a brick thrown through my window," Herman Boone says. "It was something far more devastating to any human being than a brick could be. I guess Disney, being the family movie production company that it is, felt that to depict a toilet stool coming through your window was a bit much ... I've never gotten over that incident that particular night, because I could never understand how anybody could feel so bad about another human being as to throw a toilet commode through a window."

After his house was vandalized, did Herman Boone really get his gun?
No. Herman Boone did not own a gun. -ESPN.com

Did the T.C. Williams Titans ever dance on the field during warm-ups like in the movie?
No. The Titans never did a song and dance routine on the field during warm-ups.

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