True-Life Story of Olympian ‘Gail Devers’

A gifted female track star overcoming a near-tragic illness to win Olympic gold is a compelling true-life story. Sunday’s TV dramatization, “Run for the Dream: The Gail Devers Story,” lacks the depth to be as compelling, but Charlayne Woodard in the title role and Louis Gossett Jr. as her tough coach are a class act.

Woodard clearly worked hard to prepare for her role as Devers, a young track phenom who came close to having her feet amputated after complications due to Graves’ disease and radiation therapy, then bounced back 18 months later to win the 1992 Olympic gold medal in the women’s 100-meter sprint. That preparation pays off in a sinewy muscularity and form that makes the track scenes believable.

As Bob Kersee, Gossett carefully treads a fine line between harshness and caring, playing a coach who blames his star athlete for slacking off and not giving her all, until it is learned what is causing her increasingly debilitating symptoms. Devers’ problems were mistakenly attributed at first to stress; Graves’ disease, a condition affecting the thyroid, wasn’t diagnosed for more than a year after symptoms began.

Neema Barnette directed; the teleplay was written by Dianne Houston and Scott Abbott.

* “Run for the Dream: The Gail Devers Story” airs at 8 p.m. Sunday on Showtime.