The summary and note for this entry were completed with participation from the AFI Academic Network. Summary and note were written by participant Thor Dodson, a student at Oregon State University, with Jon Lewis as academic advisor.

End credits include a “Special Thanks” to the following organizations and individuals: Playboy Enterprises, Inc.; Robert H. Kovoloff, Associated Film Promotions, Inc.; Radio Station KVIL Dallas-Fort Worth, Ron Chapman; and Texas Cowgirls, Inc.
       According to a 13 Jun 1973 Var news item, director-producer Richard Brooks bid $125,000 for the film rights to Peter Gent’s best-selling novel North Dallas Forty; however, Columbia Pictures made a higher bid, winning the rights with their offer of “$200,000 plus escalation, plus profit participation.” Gent, formerly a professional football player for the Dallas Cowboys, was represented by the Stirling Lord Agency, who brokered the author’s deal with Columbia. Stanley Schneider, then president of Columbia’s picture division, was attached to produce the film and later took it with him when he left the studio to become an independent producer, as stated in a 26 Sep 1973 Var item. Schneider set up the project at Paramount Pictures Corp., and a 20 Mar 1974 HR news brief announced that Hal Ashby would direct and Jeremy Larner was set to write. Nancy Dowd later replaced Larner as the writer, according to a 20 Feb 1979 DV report. Schneider suddenly died on 22 Jan 1975.
       A 25 Jun 1975 DV news item from Army Archerd reported that Robert Altman was later attached as director with Dino De Laurentiis slated to produce and John Binder slated to write; actors Elliott Gould and James Caan were being considered for roles. According to a 20 Apr 1978 LAT brief, De Laurentiis’s production company had agreed to produce the film for Lion’s Gate Films under a “pay or play deal” along with three other films, but Lion’s Gate later sued De Laurentiis, alleging that the producer backed out in 1976 and paid only $600,000 of the $1.7 million owed per the contract. Research has been inconclusive to date regarding an affiliation between Lion’s Gate Films, spelled Lion Gate Films in the LAT item, and Lionsgate Films.
       A 29 Sep 1977 HR news item announced that actor Nick Nolte had acquired the rights to North Dallas Forty and planned to produce the film; however, Nolte did not ultimately receive a producer credit. In a 13 Sep 1978 LAT article, Nolte stated that he played football “15 hours a day until [his] hands were rubbed smooth” when he was growing up in Waterloo, Iowa. In college, Nolte played football at Arizona State University, Pasadena City College, and San Diego State University, but he was never offered a position on a professional team.
       According to a 13 Sep 1978 announcement in HR, Frank Yablans, formerly the president of Paramount, was set to produce the film for the studio, with Ted Kotcheff slated to direct. After initial plans to shoot the film in Houston, TX, were nixed, production was set to take place entirely in Los Angeles, CA, as stated in a 27 Feb 1979 DV news item. Yablans explained that the move from Texas to California was financially motivated, as filming in Los Angeles would be $2 million cheaper. The shoot was scheduled for eight and a half weeks.
       Filming began 26 Feb 1979, according to studio production notes from AMPAS library files. Locations included the football fields and campus of University of California, Los Angeles; Blair Field in Long Beach; the Coliseum in downtown Los Angeles; East Los Angeles Community College; “rugged valleys and hillsides” in Thousand Oaks; and ranches near Westlake. Kotcheff worked with director of photography Paul Lohmann to shoot the football scenes from the players’ perspectives, bringing cameras closer to the action than “the view from the back of the stadium” that Kotcheff felt was prominent in other films and television shows depicting the sport. On 4 May 1979, DV and HR reported that the film had wrapped after ten weeks of shooting.
       According to a 25 Jul 1979 Var review, the National Football League (NFL) refused to participate in the making of North Dallas Forty; however, a 7 Sep 1979 LAT article stated that eighteen “active NFL players” worked on the film. Roles were offered to Dallas Cowboys players Harvey Martin and Thomas Henderson, but neither accepted, and Yablans suspected that the team pressured them not to take part, especially because the film’s fictional North Dallas Bulls were rumored to be based on the Cowboys, Gent’s former team. Though Martin was temporarily involved, according to Yablans, and a fee of “$1,500 a week plus expenses” had been negotiated for his performance, the player did not show up on set for the first day of filming. Martin reportedly visited the set later and tearfully expressed that it wasn’t “in his best interest” to act in the film, though Yablans suspected the decision was coerced.
       According to an 11 Aug 1979 Var news item, Yablans received a screenwriting credit after winning an arbitration conducted by the Writers Guild of America West (WGAW). The arbitration was automatically held due to the fact that Yablans was a production executive, and the guild’s rules stated that arbitration was necessary in the case of any production executive seeking a writing credit.
       North Dallas Forty opened in Aug 1979, one month prior to the start of the 1979 NFL season, and, according to a 17 Oct 1979 Var, received a boost later in its theatrical run when football season began. The film performed well at the box-office, earning $2,787,479 in its first weekend and comparable amounts in the following four weekends, according to a 12 Sep 1979 Var item. A 17 Oct 1979 Var news item announced that after fifty-nine days of release, the film had taken in $25,473,000 in box-office receipts.
       Critical reception was generally positive, with several reviewers pointing to Nolte’s performance as a highlight, along with performances by Bo Svenson, Mac Davis, and NFL player John Matuszak. Var and HR reviews from 25 Jul 1979 noted Kotcheff’s adeptness at addressing the darker side of football; Var stated, “Most people understand that modern-day athletes are just cogs in a big business wheel, but getting that across on screen is a whole different matter.” In her 1 Aug 1979 NYT review, Janet Maslin commented that the “cynicism and comedy of the film don’t always mix…But the director, Ted Kotcheff, has arrived at an unexpectedly delicate balance by the time the film is over.”
       A 7 Sep 1979 LAT article reported that the NFL had fired three players, Tommy Reamon, Tom Fears, and Fred Biletnikoff, all of whom took part in North Dallas Forty; though Reamon claimed that the firings were directly related to the players’ involvement with the film, Pete Rozelle, the NFL’s commissioner, stated that the accusation was “absolutely ridiculous.” Reamon played “Delma” in the film, and both Fears and Biletnikoff served as advisors. Yablans did not believe there was a conspiracy; however, he stated, “my feeling is that football is such a business that if a player’s important to a team, he plays. But with a borderline player, well, this movie might be the catalyst for a team to get rid of him.” LAT also reported that John Matuszak, who played “O. W. Shaddock,” was rumored to be having trouble re-negotiating his contract with the Oakland Raiders, but Matuszak claimed that he hadn’t heard of a conspiracy and that he had signed a three-year contract two months prior. Unlike Matuszak, Gent believed there was a conspiracy and felt similarly in 1974, when two of the three major television networks had refused to run a commercial advertising his book due to their broadcast deals with the NFL.