The Pittsburgh Steelers are going Hollywood.

Sort of.

HBO and the NFL announced Monday that the acclaimed football documentary series “Hard Knocks” will feature the AFC North during a late-season run.

The Steelers, Baltimore Ravens, Cleveland Browns and Cincinnati Bengals will be subjects of the popular HBO program, which will premiere Dec. 3 and run at 9 p.m. each Tuesday for the remainder of the season and into the playoffs. After each episode is shown, it will be available to stream anytime on MAX.

“Last season the AFC North became the first division ever to have all four teams finish with a winning record, making it the perfect place to launch this new approach to Hard Knocks,” NFL Films vice president and head of content Keith Cossrow said in a statement. “We thank the Bengals, Browns, Ravens and Steelers for the opportunity to showcase some of the greatest rivalries in football and present the intensity of a playoff chase from all four corners of this incredibly competitive division.”

“Hard Knocks” began in 2001 as a training-camp access show in which cameras were permitted to follow a team to areas otherwise off-limits. That inaugural season featured the Ravens. More than 20 other seasons of the show have followed. Though several NFL seasons were skipped early on, “Hard Knocks” has run at least once annually since 2012. By 2020, the show began to tweak its format — that summer, following two teams (the Los Angeles Rams and Chargers) and the next year adding an in-season edition.

In 2024, it previously had been announced the Chicago Bears would be chronicled during training camp and the New York Giants would be the subject of a yet-to-air offseason edition of the show.

Among the NFL’s most recognizable flagship franchises, the league and network surely would have welcomed the Steelers onto the show at any point.

But coach Mike Tomlin over the years has repeatedly done little to hide his lack of enthusiasm for his team being a subject of “Hard Knocks.” The league more than decade ago put in qualifications and parameters for when teams would not be allowed to veto selection. But the full division format has made those guidelines moot.

Back when the show’s format was one-team, training-camp only, the Steelers met the then-requirements for getting featured for the 2020 season of the show: teams that did not have a first-year head coach, had missed the playoffs the past two seasons and had not been featured on the show in a decade.

The moment of levity in #Steelers coach Mike Tomlin’s final news conference, thanks to a @JColony13 question and @tribjoerutter follow-up about #HardKnocks. pic.twitter.com/E8zRmcoY0O

— Kevin Gorman (@KevinGormanPGH) December 31, 2019

With the Steelers eligible to be on “Hard Knocks” under those parameters, Tomlin was asked soon after the end of the 2019 season if he had any thoughts.

“I don’t,” he said during a Dec. 31, 2019, news conference.

In a follow-up, Tomlin was queried that day on if the Steelers would do the show if the NFL and HBO asked them to.

“Asked?” Tomlin said, grinning out of the corner of his mouth while cocking his head sideways.

It might be of note that in the official release for the AFC North version of “Hard Knocks” posted on the Steelers official website, no quotes were attributed to Steelers personnel. By contrast, the Bengals ran two pieces on their website about the show and included reaction from coach Zac Taylor.

“We don’t think — we know — this is the best division in football,” Taylor said to Bengals.com. “I understand why it’s an attractive pick for ‘Hard Knocks’ and it’s an honor to be part of a division that people think so highly of. We have an exciting team with a lot of really talented players and good team guys. They are players that the league is excited about, so this exposure is a positive.”

The Ravens (2001), Bengals (2009 and 2013) and Browns (2018) all have been featured on the show previously.

In retrospect, it probably is no coincidence the “quirk” in the Steelers’ 2024 schedule announced last month that they will play all six of their AFC North games over the final eight weeks of the season.

While the quarterbacks, head coaches and other recognizable, All-Pro players such as T.J. Watt, Minkah Fitzpatrick and Cameron Heyward are the types often featured on “Hard Knocks,” the series typically does zero in on the personalities or storylines surrounding lesser-known players with outsized personalities.

Inside linebacker Patrick Queen is an obvious choice for a prominent role on the show. Signed to a $41 million contract in March — the most ever given by the Steelers to a free agent from another team — Queen spent his first four seasons with Baltimore and will face the Ravens twice after Nov. 17.

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