‘America’s Sweethearts’ is the latest Greg Whiteley masterpiece

As of a few weeks ago, I didn’t care at all about the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders. Lest that sound too harsh, I don’t mean I disliked them, or had any sort of antagonism toward them as humans. If they were hurt on the side of the road, I would stop to help. I just didn’t have any interest in them as a collective group, nor did I know anything about their sport.

But as of today, I care deeply for every individual on the squad and am invested in their careers, thanks to “America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.”

“America’s Sweethearts” is the latest Netflix series from creator Greg Whiteley , best known for “Mitt,” the documentary that chronicled Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, and also the Emmy-winning docuseries “Cheer,” about competitive cheerleading, and “Last Chance U,” another Emmy-winning docuseries about a Mississippi junior football league.

But it was one of Whiteley’s earlier projects — “New York Doll” — that first caught my attention. The documentary follows Arthur “Killer” Kane, a friend of Whiteley’s from his Latter-day Saint congregation who happened to once belong to a glam-rock group. The film was so honest and so loving in its portrayal of Kane and his longing to reunite with his band that it felt like nothing I had seen before.

Whiteley brought that same honest and sympathetic lens to “America’s Sweethearts.” The series follows the cheerleaders auditioning and performing in the 2022-2023 Cowboys season. It manages to endear the viewer to each individual featured — from the cheerleaders, to the coaches, to the bus drivers, to the cheerleaders’ loved ones — while not shying away from the very apparent systemic issues in the world of professional cheerleading.

In 2022, Whiteley told the Deseret News , “If you’re trying to scrub away someone’s warts, you’re also going to lose the thing that makes them beautiful and human.” And there are plenty of warts in the world of cheerleading on display.

One of the most glaring issues is the pressure on the women to meet a certain aesthetic standard. The cheerleaders’ bodies and faces are constantly scrutinized by the coaches and audition judges, and the cheerleaders are told that their wildly revealing uniforms will not be altered after the original fitting. One member of the squad reveals her yearslong struggle with disordered eating. One hopeful cheerleader is released from tryouts simply for being too short compared to the other girls on the field.

The safety of the cheerleaders seems tenuous at times. One of the veteran cheerleaders recalls a time she found an AirTag on her car, meaning someone was tracking her to her home. Another cheerleader is groped by a cameraman during a performance.

Perhaps the biggest controversy is how much the cheerleaders are paid. While no one in the series reveals exactly how much the cheerleaders make, one member of the squad says she makes about what she would make if she worked full time at Chick-fil-A.

According to NBC Sports Boston , in 2022, the Cowboys cheerleaders made $15-$20 an hour. Meanwhile, the average NFL player makes about $2 million per season. When asked why the cheerleaders make so little, Charlotte Jones, who serves as the team’s chief brand officer and is the daughter of owner Jerry Jones, explains that the cheerleaders aren’t there for the money, but for the opportunity to perform at an elite level. Why the men who perform a sport at an elite level and the women who do the same are paid so differently is never explained.

Jones tells the camera, “They come here for something that’s actually bigger than that to them. They have a passion for dance. There are not a lot of opportunities in the field of dance to get to perform at an elite level.”

That much is apparent. Despite all the downsides to the vocation, the cheerleaders’ passion for their sport — and their desire to make the world’s most renowned cheerleading squad — is so apparent that at times it feels like you can reach out and touch it. And it’s tough for the viewer to not feel the same devastation the women feel when they are cut from the team for not having the right look, or not having a high-enough kick, or not fitting in the uniform correctly. Whiteley has managed to make the story of the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders a universal tale, as all good documentarians do.

Most everyone knows what it’s like to have a passion for something and want to do it, regardless of how hard it is to achieve or how difficult it may be to maintain. Whether that’s reuniting with your ‘70s glam-rock band, being elected president of the United States or becoming a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, Whiteley is a master at showing that drive and struggle, and bringing the viewer along for the often tumultuous but always rewarding ride. Which is why I now care about the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders and bet you will too.