It’s not Zidane-head-butt-to-the-chest invigorating, but the documentary “Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos” does provide an exuberant look at a heady moment in America’s soccer past that is well worth remembering.
The Cosmos were established in 1971, in time for the fourth season of the North American Soccer League. As the league’s average attendance inched up, teams began supplementing their rosters of mostly former college players and immigrants with past-their-prime international stars.
By 1975, the NASL had expanded to 20 franchises and, in what would prove to be a revolutionary move, the Cosmos signed the sport’s biggest star, Edson Arantes do Nascimento, better known as Pelé. At 34, Pelé was nearing the end of his playing career but was one of the world’s most recognizable sports figures, and his arrival gave the league a much-needed shot of credibility and, more important, marketability.
In his three years with the Cosmos, the team moved from dingy Downing Stadium on Randall’s Island to Yankee Stadium and finally to Giants Stadium in New Jersey, where they set U.S. attendance records for soccer, drawing 77,000 fans for a playoff game.
The Cosmos brought in other stars in the wake of Pelé – including Italian striker Giorgio Chinaglia, Germany’s Franz Beckenbauer and Carlos Alberto from Brazil. Other NASL teams – including the Los Angeles Aztecs with Johann Cruyff of the Netherlands – tried to compete by signing stars of their own, but none experienced a similar attendance boom.
The team was a phenomenon as flashy and glitzy as the city it represented. Players were treated like movie stars and were regulars at Studio 54 and other hot spots. During the Cosmos’ breakout 1977 season, when the team handily competed for headlines with the hunt for the Son of Sam serial killer, the city’s infamous blackout and a New York Yankees team on its way to its first World Series championship in 15 seasons, average attendance nearly doubled to more than 34,000.
Against this backdrop, the Cosmos’ flameout was nothing short of spectacular.
The league’s overexpansion and careless spending, compounded by its inability to draw TV viewers, led to many teams folding. From its peak of 24 teams in 1978, the league dwindled to nine by its final season in 1984. The Cosmos suffered from mismanagement and, along with several other NASL teams, joined the Major Indoor Soccer League but dropped out the following year and finally expired after attempting to make a go of it as an independent.
One noticeable omission – and not for a lack of trying on the part of the filmmakers, who none too subtly imply that he declined to be interviewed over money – is Pelé himself.
He’s present in archival footage and his importance is described in detail, but his opinions would have been welcome.
Propelled by an eclectic mix of period pop and a sprinkling of opera on its soundtrack, “Once in a Lifetime” is a lively, freewheeling amusement. An abundance of clips is nicely enhanced by interviews with notable participants, including soccer fan Henry Kissinger (who helped pave the way for the coming of Pelé), broadcaster Marv Albert, the Ertegun brothers, Beckenbauer, Alberto, Cosmos players Shep Messing and Werner Roth, longtime Cosmos executive Clive Toye and NASL Commissioner Phil Woosnam.
Once in a lifetime? Perhaps. We may get a redux in a few years if David Beckham jumps the pond and comes to America in an attempt to boost Major League Soccer’s fortunes, but it’s unlikely it will approach the level of frenzy Pelé and the Cosmos achieved. Then again, Pelé wasn’t married to a Spice Girl.