History Series / TheRightStuff

* GutturalGrowler: Gus Grissom has a very low, gravely voice that really helps him stand out despite not getting much focus. Likewise Deke Slayton.

** John Glenn is a Democrat and supports Kennedy in the presidential election. He is told that if he publicly endorses Nixon, it will guaranee he spot as the fist man in space. Glenn is tempted but instead doubles down on Kennedy.

'''The Right Stuff''' is an eight-part limited series produced by Creator/NationalGeographicChannel and airing on Creator/DisneyPlus. It is the second adaptation of Tom Wolfe's book of the same name, after [[Film/TheRightStuff the 1983 film]]. As with both the book and the movie, it follows the Mercury Seven astronauts as they and their families become instant celebrities during UsefulNotes/TheSpaceRace.

* NotSoDifferent:

** Alan Shepard is first shown naked in bed with a beautiful woman, charming her with his poetic description of flying a plane. She says that she does not mind that he is married but he still refuses to tell her his name. We then see him in the officer's club trying to talk his commanding officer more flying time and being told that he should accept that his promotion out of a flying job is a good thing. Shepard is TheCasanova who cheats on his wife and resents being KickedUpstairs.

* RuleOfDrama: A huge amount of this. Among other things, the relationship between Shepard and Glenn, the feuding between Kraft and Von Braun and Cooper's strained relationship with his wife were all considerably less fraught than seen here.
** Probably the best example is when Cooper and Grissom have a nasty public fallout over an incident where Gus claims Gordo didn't bother with the pre-flight check and nearly got them both killed when the plane crashed. While the crash happened, it was ruled a mechanical failure, and had nothing to do with anything the pilots did.

** The historical Glenn did write a letter to Gilruth protesting the peer assessment way Shepard was chosen in hopes the decision would be reversed - but never stooped to the letter-writing campaign against Shepard seen here (though as in the show, he did get a chewing out from Gilruth over it). By all accounts, once the decision was made Glenn threw himself into providing effective support for the mission, even if he still felt he deserved the spot

* TruthInTelevision: Glenn's insistence they all be aware of their image and the program's is presented as overly self-righteous, but government organizations like NASA really are [[SlaveToPR extremely publicity-conscious]] for fear that negative headlines or a scandal raise questions in Congress that could affect their funding. A messy public divorce was considered one of the reasons Donn Eisele never received another mission after Apollo 7.

* NotSoDifferent: Shepard invokes this on Glenn at the end after they've made peace, reasoning that both of them always have that hunger to do something greater than what they've done before. Glenn is visibly discomfited by it.

** Probably the best example is when Shepard explodes at Glenn for getting Shorty Powers (and thereby NASA) involved in quashing the newspaper story on his fling, souring their relationship thereafter. In reality, Powers was the one who contacted Glenn about it.

* AdaptationalJerkass: The historical Glenn did write a letter to Gilruth protesting the peer assessment way Shepard was chosen - but never stooped to the letter-writing campaign against Shepard seen here. By all accounts, once the decision was made Glenn threw himself into providing effective support for the mission.

** He's a massive prick about it due to his dislike of his son joining the Navy instead of the Army, but Shepard's father is correct that his son's family have renamed poor Judith without bothering to ask her what she thinks about it.

* AdaptationalJerkass: The historical Glenn did write a letter to Gilruth protesting the peer assessment way Shepard was chosen - but never stopped to the letter-writing campaign seen here. By all accounts, once the decision was made Glenn threw himself into providing effective support for the mission.

** Chris Kraft badly burned his hand as a child. When he applied for flight training, the damage was deemed to extensive and he was rejected.

* TruthInTelevision: While the series presents Glenn's efforts to get his teammates to consider their image more as self-righteous preaching, NASA really did become a SlaveToPR as being so hugely in the public eye in the 1960s led to astronauts being pressured to keep their home lives under wraps in case scandal affected the program. A messy public divorce was considered one of the reasons Donn Eisele never received another mission after Apollo 7.