The Black Donnellys

Producer Bobby Moresco conceived of the series based on his own experiences growing up in New York's Hell's Kitchen.

Co-creator Paul Haggis drew on the real-life history of the Black Donnellys, an Irish family from Lucan near his hometown of London, Ontario, who were murdered in the 1800s due to feuds with local residents, and wanted to infuse that story's tragedy and community cover-up into the series.

Haggis and Moresco had previously created the short-lived 1996 series EZ Streets, which similarly centered on mob activity and explored comparable themes, and they began developing The Black Donnellys before EZ Streets was even cancelled, though work didn't start in earnest until March 2006 when their film Crash received Oscar nominations and they got offers to produce the show.

The show's Hell's Kitchen setting was a fictional composite created by blending elements of Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn to look like a single neighborhood, similar to how Haggis and Moresco had combined parts of Detroit, Chicago, and L.A. into one unrecognizable city for EZ Streets.

The series was originally scheduled to debut in NBC's fall 2006 lineup but was delayed to January 2007 to cover for ER's hiatus; when ER's strong fall ratings led NBC to cancel that hiatus, the show was pushed further to March 2007 before ultimately premiering in February 2007 as a mid-season replacement for the struggling Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.

The show was pulled from NBC's primetime lineup on April 9, 2007, and officially cancelled on April 14, 2007, but the remaining unaired episodes were still made available on NBC's website and iTunes.

After cancellation, HDNet acquired the rights from NBC Universal to broadcast all 13 episodes, starting June 13, 2007, and a complete series DVD set including the 7 previously unaired episodes was released on September 4, 2007.

On Rotten Tomatoes, the season holds a 40% approval rating based on 30 reviews, with critics praising the cast's performances, especially Jonathan Tucker and Tom Guiry, while criticizing the writing as heavy-handed and overly reliant on Irish-American mob clichés.