The Shuffle

It was a 40 minute, ESPN short. Not a lot of substance to it. This era has been beaten to death. It's a topic that is too singular for an ESPN short. If they were to do a special on the 85 Bears, that's been done as well. All in all, it's a waste of time. Good to see the players coherent but not worth the watch.

I was genuinely looking forward to this HBO original documentary from NFL Films because it was such a strange phenomenon in the world of football that somehow managed to cross over into the consciousness of pop culture.

It's not terrible but it's nowhere near the quality of some of the other sports documentaries put out by HBO and ESPN.

At just 40 minutes in length, either the subject matter didn't warrant the time to tell the story or Director Jeff Cameron failed to find a more interesting angle to chronicle why the video and song for "The Super Bowl Shuffle" connected with an audience outside the normal NFL fan.

The first-hand accounts from players like Mike Singletary, Willie Gault, and Jim McMahon were decent but this felt more like a featured piece you'd see during an episode of Sportscenter.

They should have called this The Bowl, because it swirled around until it finally flushed. The fact that this was only 30minutes told you that they lacked the content to do a compelling piece, This would have been a great 10 minute segment in a Bears history, but it really didn't stand on it's own.

If you have seen the video, you see the team has no rhythm, you can tell what players were added in post and above all, it was clear those terrible lyrics were not written by the on field talent.

Great to have surviving players to share their perspective, but there wasn't enough meat on the bone to do an HBO worthy documentary.

3 Stars.

Greetings again from the darkness. Which pro football team had a hit song that reached number 41 on the pop charts and was awarded a gold record? Well, if you were around in 1985, you probably know it was the Chicago Bears and their song, "The Super Bowl Shuffle". Director Jeff Cameron ("Hard Knocks") in partnership with NFL Films proceeds to tell us more than we ever cared to know about the team, the song, and the video.

The film opens with the 12-0 Bears headed to Miami to play on Monday Night Football. As Jim McMahon says, that "was not our night". The perfect season was no longer possible after Dan Marino and the Dolphins won 38-24. The nugget of information that makes this interesting is that it was the day after this game when the Bears were scheduled to film their music video. You can imagine the mood of the team had changed. Willie Gault knew linebacker Mike Singletary was key to uniting the guys and keeping to the commitment.

Mix Engineer Fred Breitberg is interviewed and spills a bit of trivia when he lets us know that the song was adapted from "The Kingfish Shuffle", part of "The Amos 'n Andy Show" (from the 1950's). It was Jovan CEO Dick Meyer who had the brainstorm for the music video, and his surviving spouse lets us know that was her in the referee uniform blowing the whistle in the video (another bit of trivia). Sportswriter Rick Telander provides some perspective on the times and the impact of the Bears and video ... they were media stars.

We do get to go behind the scenes (on set) as the video is filmed, and it's pretty funny to watch these sports giants struggle to get the dance steps down. Poor Leslie Frazier is crowned the team's worst dancer and takes a bit of grief from his teammates, as you would expect. Then we see Walter Payton and Jim McMahon superimposed over the team portion, as they both skipped the initial filming. Was the team challenging karma by recording the video prior to qualifying for the Super Bowl? Or were they just confident? Either way, Singletary firmly believes the project led to a deep bonding with teammates that never would have happened without the video.

This was the MTV era and the video (VHS) and record (45 rpm) went viral - well what was considered viral in the pre-internet days. The team raised over $300,000 for Chicago Community Trust (a charity) and ultimately lost the Grammy to a fellow from Minneapolis that went by the name Prince. After the Bears trounced the Patriots in the Super Bowl, it left us wondering if the lyrics were misleading ... it certainly seemed like this team really was there to 'start some trouble'. A final piece of buried trivia that the film uncovers is that the Patriots actually responded with a video of their own. No one seemed to notice.

Debuts November 25, 2025 on HBO.