Thursday, July 23, the Richmond Flying Squirrels continue their “Movies in the Outfield” series with the 2000 film “Remember the Titans.” The movie, set in Alexandria during 1971, is about a football team formed at T.C. Williams High School after school integration and stars Denzel Washington as the team’s head coach. Recently, the Alexandria school board announced that it is considering a change to the name of the school; Williams was a former superintendent who was opposed to integration.
Before the showing, Derick “Sugarbabe” Hopson, a defensive back on the team that inspired the movie, will talk about the film and his experience with the team. Hopson moved to Richmond after graduating to attend Virginia Union University. Now 67, he owns a wallcovering business in Chesterfield. In our interview, the former player shares his thoughts on the name of his old school and how it feels to be part of the “Remember the Titans” story.
Richmond magazine: How does it feel to have your story in a movie that everyone loves?
Derick Hopson: Blessed. The whole thing came out of when I was born, where I was raised and the events that occurred during that time period that led up to this football team. It helped heal the city. So, there's a story that was told, and I'm blessed to even tell it.
RM: Why do you think “Remember the Titans” is still so popular?
Hopson: There's a story to be told. How did the three schools come together in a way that we were integrated? It was only six years from … integration [of public schools]. There was still racial bias in the city at that time that they brought the schools together to combine [into] one high school. So from that, [the] football team, it set the rest of the school year, and they set the tone for the rest of the school. That senior class seemed to set the tone for the city to become more [aware of] the racial problems that we had, social problems that we had.
RM: How do you feel about T.C. Williams High School changing its name?
Hopson: Yeah, why not? Because if you don't know who T.C. was, he was the superintendent of the school system in Alexandria, and he was racist. He wasn't an integration advocate. So, now we go through these changes, to denounce some of the past, because America's past hurts a race of people.
RM: What do you do now?
Hopson: I've been in business for 25 years. I have a wallcovering business, and in short layman's terms, I have a wallpaper company. I wallpaper hotels, and I wallpaper office buildings. I use the term "wallcovering" because there's nothing made out of paper anymore.
Tickets are $8 per person, with children ages 3 and younger admitted free. The Q&A with Hopson starts at 7:05 p.m., and the movie begins at 7:35 p.m. Social distancing during the event is required. For more information, visit SquirrelsBaseball.com/Movies.
