The Reel Review
During his 20 years as the Athletics Department doctor at Ohio State University, it is believed that Dr. Richard Strauss sexually abused thousands of male student athletes, ranging from inappropriate touching during examinations, ogling and masturbating while showering with student athletes multiple times a day, ending the sports careers of students who didn’t allow him to touch them inappropriately, and even drugging and raping dozens of students. This HBO Max crime documentary explores how so many officials at Ohio State knew what was happening yet shockingly allowed it to persist for such a long time.
The documentary is profoundly damning for former Ohio State Wrestling Head Coach Russ Hellickson and Assistant Coach Jim Jordan (now a U.S. Congressman). Their continued public claims that they were unaware of what Strauss was up to pales when such an extraordinary number of student athletes and even a wrestling referee whom Strauss sexually assaulted in the locker room shower said the two not only were well aware but often commented about it, and that Jordan even gave Strauss a locker next to his in the men’s locker room.
The screenplay from Sports Illustrated writer Jon Wertheim is a pretty straightforward tell, with Oscar-winning Australian documentary director Eva Orner (Taxi to the Dark Side) mixing interviews of Strauss’s many accusers with stock footage and excerpts from lawsuit depositions of Ohio State employees. Despite Ohio State’s continued efforts to dismiss the lawsuits, the third act comes with a thunderous message – if you don’t report something when you see it, you may just find yourself being reported.
REEL FACTS
• Dr. Richard Strauss is accused of sexually abusing wrestlers, male gymnasts, fencers, lacrosse players, swimmers, divers, hockey players, soccer players, track and field athletes, golfers, baseball players, tennis players, water polo players, football players, male cheerleaders and volleyball players. After he was retired in 1996, Strauss opened a private off-campus clinic where he continued to sexually abuse male patients. He died from suicide in August 2005, complaining in his suicide note of unbearable pain problems.
• As of 2023, five lawsuits against Ohio State University from 236 men were still pending.
• Russ Hellickson, who won a silver medal in the 100kg division at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, served as a wrestling announcer for ABC at the 1984 Olympics and for NBC at the 1988, 1992 and 1996 Olympics.
Video & Photo
