The Black Donnellys was created by Paul Haggis and Robert Moresco and starred Jonathan Tucker, Olivia Wilde, Billy Lush, Tom Guiry, Kirk Acevedo, Michael Stahl-David, and Keith Nobbs.

The series follows four young Roman Catholic Irish-American brothers in New York City's Hell's Kitchen neighborhood and their involvement with petty and organized crime, specifically the Irish Mob.

In the pilot episode, Joey says the neighborhood is populated primarily by "Black Irish", whom he calls "a race of dark-haired people" the Celts had failed to wipe out in Ireland.

[7][8] Co-creator Paul Haggis also wanted to reference the real-life Black Donnellys, an Irish family from Lucan near his hometown of London, Ontario who were murdered in the 1800s because of ongoing feuds with local residents.

[8] Haggis and Moresco began developing the idea for The Black Donnellys prior to EZ Streets' cancellation, but did not begin to work on the show until March 2006, when their film Crash became nominated for Oscars and they received offers to produce the series.

"[3] In Slant Magazine, Emily St. James wrote, "It’s not horribly original stuff, but on basic network television, where the same handful of shots seems to turn up on every show, it feels strikingly fresh.

"[27][12] Others said the Donnelly brothers were not believable as Irish-American mobsters,[28][27][13][29] with Matthew Gilbert of The Boston Globe likening the show to "a network version of The Sopranos with pretty boys".

[30] The Los Angeles Times' Paul Brownfield likened the depiction of Hell's Kitchen to "Scorsese's Creek"[12] and the New York Post's Linda Stasi said it felt anachronistic.

The site’s critics consensus reads, "The Black Donnellys has Irish swagger to spare and an appealing cast, but the series' overreliance on signature tropes of better mob stories only underscores its lack of authenticity and imagination.