MikeTyson’s bio series, which opens worldwide this Thursday, promises to be one of the strongest and most controversial releases of the year. Here you will see Star +but it was originally produced by Hulu.
platform streaming who broadcasts it in the United States was involved in the first controversy: he was accused by the boxer of not paying him the rights to face his life and career.
“Don’t be fooled by Hulu. I don’t support your story about my life. This isn’t 1822. This is 2022. They stole my story and didn’t pay me,” Tyson wrote on Instagram. Real anger or promotion strategy?
The concrete thing is that this Thursday the first two chapters are published – out of a total of eight – of this fiction created by Steven Rodgers – writer of Me, Tonia– which was advertised as “an unlicensed, no holds barred look at the life of Mike Tyson”, the most spectacular knockout in boxing history.
The sprinter the world knew in Moonlight
Trevante Rhodes was the actor chosen to play the more adult “Iron Mike”. BJ Minor embodies the young Tysonbut it should be a less explored phase from the series, whose motto is “Beyond Tyson”.
Rhodes is 32 years old and was born in Ponchatoula, Louisiana. He grew up between that town and Little Elm, Texas when his family moved there when he was ten. At school, Rhodes played football as a power runner and also He was a sprinter of 100 and 200 meters..
During his senior year as a high school student, he suffered a severe anterior cruciate ligament injury that ultimately hampered his future in football. But he kept running, and won an athletics scholarship as a track sprinter at the University of Texasin Austin, where he competed for the Texas Longhorns university team from 2008 to 2012.
And it looks like it had potential. Because he was called to join the US national team at the 2009 Pan American Junior Athletics Games. There he helped his country win the gold medal in the 4 × 100m relay.
After studies kinesiology, Trevonte moved to KwaThema, a small town in South Africa. but immediately he started working as a supporting actor in some films.
It is clear that Tyson’s role is the most important in Rhodes’ short career. But many they already recognize it for in the moonlight (Moonlight)the raw drama of Barry Jenkins that won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2016 and put it on the global radar.
In the acclaimed film he played the adult version of Chiron, the protagonist who grows up in a depressed suburb and conflicted Miami, a difficult environment to develop as a homosexual man.
Emulating Mike
It is clear that those responsible for casting Mike they looked for an actor with a bone and muscle structure similar to Tyson’s. And Rhodes had already shown his stout build in the moonlight. In fact, just like in the Star + series, his physique was the key to the role and the story.
In Moonlightthe idea of showing the adult Chiron as an oversized and intimidating man contrasts sharply with the thin and vulnerable adolescent trying to make his way through a complicated family and social context.
They say that Trevante is a training obsessive and apparently, he hasn’t stopped gaining muscle mass since his days as a sprinter and power runner in Texas.
“I wake up at 4:30, meditate, then go to the gym for a couple of hours.I do situps, whatever muscle for the day, I run and we start the day at eight, “the actor told the magazine Men’s health.
“I think it all starts mentally and spiritually, emotionally,” added the performer who had a starring role in Netflix’s post-apocalyptic thriller. Bird Box -made by Sandra Bullock-; and played undercover federal agent Jimmy Fletcher in the biographical drama United States versus Billie Holliday (2021).
A life marked by lights and shadows
Nobody is unaware that the life of Michael Gerard Tyson, who is now 56 years old, it had as many lights as shadows. His rise to the top of sport in the 1980s was overshadowed by a conviction for rape that took him to prison in 1992.
After an early release from prison for good behavior, back with glory on the rings. But his figure as an indestructible fighter has been diluted in his last fights, especially after that remembered rematch with Evandro Holyfieldwhere he was disqualified for biting his rival’s ears.
a fierce boxer, perhaps the most dazzling knockout of all time, Tyson has racked up 44 knockouts with 50 wins in a total of 58 fights. He was the youngest world champion in the heavyweight category in 1986.
Retired and troubledin 2016 he created a company that sells all kinds of marijuana-related products, from food to “premium” crops. Wow, his story is worth telling.
Mike’s hub and his inner circle
Beyond what his followers and detractors think, Mike tries to investigate the social context surrounding Tyson’s futurecrossed by themes such as racism, classism, fame, the power of the media, misogyny and the questionable promise of the “American dream” in the United States.
Rhodes in the lead role is joined by Russell Hornsby (Fences), who plays the controversial Don King, a boxing promoter and representative of other boxing icons such as Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard, George Foreman and Julio Cesar Chavezwho, like Tyson, is suing him for misappropriation of money, among other crimes.
the recognized Harvey Keitel He also participates in the production as manager and boxing coach Cus D’Amato, and joins the cast with Li Eubanks (My Name is Dolemite) as model Desiree Washington, who has sued him for rape.
They are joined by Scott MacDonald (real sugar) in the role of another Tyson trainer; Laura Harris (The KKKlan infiltrator) as his ex-wife Robin Givens and Grace Zabriskie (Twin peaks) as Camile D’Amato, wife of Cus, among others.
Source: Clarin
