James Toback’s "Tyson"

"Who is to blame for this most recent of sports disgraces in America? The culture that flings young athletes like Tyson up out of obscurity, makes millionaires of them and watches them self-destruct?" – Joyce Carol Oates/Rape and the Boxing Ring (1992)

I first met Mike Tyson three years ago at Gleason's Gym in Brooklyn. I'd seen him fight many times, and was in awe of his speed and power, his ambition and success, at the same time as I was troubled at how elemental, how primal he appeared, embodying as he did all the unchecked impulses that have fueled mankind's worst excesses – the killer instinct, the will to win at any cost.

Tyson was in the ring teaching youngsters the rudiments of boxing, fulfilling a public service agreement in lieu of doing more time for one of his many run-ins with the law. He was no longer champion. His glory years were behind him. He'd been in an out of jail more times than anyone could count. And his fortune, the hundreds of millions he earned by scrambling other men's brains, had been squandered or stolen by Don King and other "leeches," as Tyson calls them, supposedly administering to his welfare.

Watching Tyson that afternoon, I was, even though surrounded by all manner of celebrity gawker, able to observe him unmolested. He was not especially tall, but he was exceptionally broad, with a huge head adorned by the now-famous Maori tattoo, and hands and feet that looked more like paws than any known human appendage. And his physical presence – the knowledge that here was Mike Tyson – seemed to electrify the molecules around him. But rather than give off an air of intimidation, he emanated vulnerability.

Tyson and I spoke for half an hour and he couldn't have been more kind. Gentlemanly and polite, he seemed as interested in me as I was interested in him and went out of his way to put me at ease. He was somewhat wary at first, natural under the circumstances, but there was no bluster, no bravado, no hostility, no preening ego or bad attitude. Tyson was humble, down-to-earth, someone who, if not quite at peace, saw himself as just another man, no better or worse than any other. It was a bit of a shock to discover that Tyson wasn't the monster I'd been led to believe. Instead, I discovered that he had been misunderstood, misrepresented, misconstrued.

James Toback's long-awaited documentary, Tyson, is an attempt to set the record straight. Toback has known Tyson since he was a teenager and had already cast him in two of his films, Black and White in 1999 and When Will I Be Loved in 2004. He is also the sort of compassionate interlocutor (although a silent and invisible presence in the film, which is a self-analytical, stream of consciousness monologue) an armored character like Tyson needs to let down his guard.

Toback culls the newsreel archive to show Tyson at different stages of his career, recounting the former champion's storybook rise from the mean streets of Brownsville to Cus D'Amato's gym in the Catskills to the bright lights of the Vegas Strip and beyond. The director hits all the highs (youngest man, at age 20, to win the heavyweight crown) and lows (the Barbara Walters interview, the rape conviction, the Bite of the Century) that are synonymous with Tyson's tale. And Toback, to his credit, and despite the empathy he feels toward his subject, doesn't pull his punches. He simply points his two cameras and lets Mike be Mike. The champ parades his man of a thousand faces, so that we get to see all sides of Tyson, often on split-screen and just as often in rapid succession, as he morphs from the violent Mike to the gracious Mike to the self-aware Mike to the clueless Mike to the self-pitying Mike to, finally, the Mike who is incomprehensible, most of all to himself.

It's easy to view Tyson as the anti-Ali, as someone who seems to have taken perverse pleasure in middle fingering the world, who appears to stand for nothing, to believe in nothing, who appears more at home receiving lap dances from floozies than awards at testimonial dinners. But that dime store analysis does a disservice to Tyson, no less than to Ali, as Toback's revealing documentary makes clear.

Beautifully filmed, Tyson, which runs 88 minutes from opening to closing bell, leaves one with the impression that it's impossible to fully understand another human being (just as it's impossible to fully understand ourselves). We can sit in judgment while lounging in our armchair or rattling around our ivory tower, but Toback's willingness to acknowledge and make allowances for human frailty, writ large in Tyson's story, makes his documentary an intrinsic document, as it also reminds us of the world of possibility, no matter how tenuous, at our fingertips. Or, as Tyson observed when Toback showed him the film for the first time: "It's like a Greek tragedy. The only problem is that I'm the subject."

(This review first appeared in Bright Lights Film Journal)

Don King Backs Bush on Katrina

Don King has found a home on Fox News. He was on “Hannity & Colmes.” King also appeared on "Your World with Neil Cavuto," where he defended George Bush’s handling of Hurricane Katrina; the crawl at the bottom of the screen read: "Don King: Stop Blaming Pres. Bush For Katrina!"

In recognition of the one year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Alessandra Stanley wrote in the New York Times that "not many ... officials were eager to go on television to defend the administration's handling of the relief effort," and that Cavuto was forced to turn "to boxing promoter Don King" to "praise the president."

Cavuto said to King, “I know you're friends with the president, like the president. He's getting a lot of bashing on Katrina. Deserved?”

"Well, the president is, I think, is a revolutionary president. He stands for inclusiveness. And not only that. He has given more women freedom than any other president in history. With the … Afghanistan … and Iraq ... and the Middle East, he has freed a lot of women. So, when the women's groups know," replied King in answer to Caputo’s question about Hurricane Katrina, "they must take note of that. A lot of women now, they've got the liberties and the freedoms, and they'll be able to vote and to be able to be active. It's because of George Walker Bush."

Cavuto tried to steer the questioning back to the subject of Bush and his handling of Katrina, and asked about the recent criticism of the president by Sen. John Kerry, and the very recent criticism of the president by giddy fitness guru Richard Simmons, which King had been listening to and watching while waiting in the Green Room before going on the air.

"Well," said King about the senator from Massachusetts, "I think that, you know, you have to take it for what it's really worth. You know, John Kerry, you know, I love the man. He's a great American, but he's a flip-flopper. So, when you're flip-flopping all the time, you don't know what stand he's really taking. So, we can disregard that."

About health nut Richard Simmons King said, "Richard Simmons is one of the greatest exercisers in the world. I adore him, his energy, his vitality to be able to exercise. But in running a country, and knowing all the different idiosyncrasies and appealing to all the people, such as George Bush is doing, Richard should stick with the exercising. Know what I mean?"

King described Katrina as "God's work" which revealed "that we had a Third World nation within the most, the most plush, luxurious, and wealthiest nation in the world. When you find that Katrina, the devastating part about Katrina, that we had people living in squalor and blight and want in Mississippi, in New Orleans and in the Mississippi Delta belt just as though they were in slavery in 1865. This is the exposure. Now, getting to take care of them, yes, little short there. You were tardy. But to recognize what it is now, and to have a mayor down there, that's Nagin, and they've got the money that they have put up to be able to do — "

Cavuto interrupted. "What do you think of Mayor Nagin?"

"I like Nagin," said King about New Orleans' controversial mayor. "I think sometimes, he, you know, he steps over the bar, but so's do everybody else. You know what I mean? I think he's down there. He got reelected. He stood the test of time."

King has given a lot of money for hurricane relief, something approaching a half mil, according to Cavuto, who then pointed out that King’s money, and the missing billions funneled from the government, seems not to have made it to New Orleans.

"That's a problem that we have to really try to get at," King said. "You know what I mean? To find out where the organizational dis-structure is, and put it into a proper fitting."

A good answer, but maybe not the answer Cavuto was looking for, because he asked King if he thought that money had been stolen.

"No, I don't think. It may, it may," King repeated, "being misplaced or not going through the pipelines as readily as it should. And I think that's where our attention should be. Just as we have all of these great organizations, the FBI, the CIA, Interpol, and the IRS, we ought to have enough brains to find out how to funnel and channel money back to where the necessary — "

Caputo interrupted again to press his point. "I've been down there, Don," he said with feeling. "They (the people) all say, 'God, we hate 'em (politicians) all.' Do you think that's justified?"

"No, that's not justified," replied King. Then he elaborated: "What we need to do is to find out what the problem is and attack that problem, which, you know, you have just demonstrated. And we must be able to resolve that — you know what I mean? Because this is a country of the people, for the people, and by the people. And, and this, this country here is one of the greatest nations in the world, called America. And so, now we should be able — with all of the MIT graduates, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cambridge, Oxford — we should be able to identify what the problem is, and resolve the problem by handling it appropriately, not through making speeches and attacking the President because he's to, he's to blame for everything from the Johnstown Flood, to World War II, to the Lindbergh kidnapping. Anything that they can find, when they can't deal with it, they jump on George Walker Bush. But let me tell you this. Even the Democrats that are castigating, vilifying, and character-assassinating him are so happy when they go to bed to know that they have a man in the White House that says what he means and means what he says, and resolves the protection of this nation."

Cavuto told King that 90% of all African-American voters voted for Kerry, or against Bush, in the last presidential election, and so King’s embrace of Bush seems an anomaly at best, cynicism at worst.

King said that African-Americans had been "indoctrinated" and "totally bamboozled," but that "it will jibe once they understand. Bush has made inclusiveness. You know, he had Colin Powell. And there's the secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, as to security. You know, now, either Bush is totally insane, or he put two blacks — who are shiftless, worthless, no account, that we all lie, cheat and steal — you know what I mean? — into positions of security, for both those who are proponents of America and those who are opponents of America. And so, he is either a man of God. Now, you know that Moses, you know, God told Moses to go to the, to the pharaohs, say, 'Let my people go.' Well, he touched George Walker Bush, and said, 'Let my people in.'"

Is Tex Cobb the Real Contender?

I recently saw Tex Cobb sitting ringside at the Blue Horizon in Philadelphia and asked him for an interview. “I don’t do interviews,” Tex said. Then he laughed.

There was a time when Cobb was more talkative. He lived his life on the razor’s edge and left a trail of wisecracks in his wake. There’s a ton of evidence suggesting the former heavyweight contender once had something to say.

“If you screw up in tennis, it’s 15-love. If you screw up in boxing,” Cobb said several years ago, “it’s your ass, darlin’.”

Although he fought for the WBC heavyweight title in the Houston Astrodome against Larry Holmes in 1982, Tex never wore the crown. No one questioned his heart or ability to take a punch — Cobb had one of the best chins in history — but all agreed that Tex lacked something essential.

Randall “Tex” Cobb was born May 7, 1950 in Bridge City, Texas. He graduated from Abilene High School in 1968. He studied philosophy and played fullback at Abilene Christian College, where he was a backfield mate of Wilbert Montgomery, who went on to star for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Tex was good with his hands, but he was not a conventional Golden Glover. He dropped out of college at the age of 19 and commenced fighting in smoke-filled Texas saloons: “Beer mugs, knees, fists, elbows, and top of your head take the place of the Marquis of Queensberry Rules,” recalled Cobb.

Cobb made a name for himself as a kickboxer rated by the PKA (Pro Karate Association). He was tough, he was a draw, and he went to Joe Frazier’s gym on Broad Street in North Philly for some formal training. Tex picked up a few fundamentals and gave the amateurs his best shot, but his best shot was not good enough: “I only had two fights as an amateur and lost both of them. Heck, I figure I didn’t have much of a future there, so I turned pro.”

His professional debut was on January 21, 1977. Tex scored a first round knockout over Pedro Vega in El Paso.

By the end of 1979, he reeled off thirteen straight wins, all of them by kayo.

“All I want to do is hit somebody in the mouth,” Cobb confessed. “It’s a whole lot easier than working for a living.”

His next fight was against a Cleveland heavyweight named Terry Mims. In 1980 Tex went the distance with Cookie Wallace. Two fights later he punched his way into the heavyweight rankings with an eighth round TKO over Earnie Shavers at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.

“The toughest thing to do in the ring is restrain myself. I want to knock the other guy in the groin,” said Cobb, “but I know I can’t do that.”

Three months later Tex dropped a controversial split decision to ex-champion Ken Norton, but Cobb was in the mix: “If I were any more serious, they’d make me a national disease.”

In 1981 he gave a good account of himself in a losing effort against Michael Dokes at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. Two fights later, Tex muscled rugged Bernardo Mercado over ten rounds. That victory set the stage for the big fight with the heavyweight champion of the world Larry Holmes.

When asked before the fight if he was afraid of Larry, Tex replied, “What the hell is this guy going to do to me? Hit me? You think I got all this scar tissue running into parked cars?”

The two men met on November 26, 1982 in Houston, Texas, and Holmes beat Cobb to within an inch of his life. For fifteen lopsided rounds, the champ pounded the challenger. Larry didn’t drop his opponent — Tex was too damn stubborn for that — but at one point Cobb turned to the ref and said “You’re white. Help me.” The ref may have been white, but the ref didn't help, so Tex stood there and took shots.

Ringside announcer Howard Cosell was calling the fight. “I have been called obnoxious, bombastic, sarcastic, confrontational and a know-it-all,” Cosell said about himself. “Of course, I am all these things.” Cosell threw up his hands in disgust at Holmes vs. Cobb and quit boxing because of the fight. Cosell said during the bout: “This is brutalization.”

Tex explained away the loss (“When I got up I stuck to my plan — stumbling forward and getting hit in the face”) but took pride in the fact that he was the man who drove Howard Cosell from the fight game for good. Cobb said it was “My gift to boxing.”

Tex won his next four fights. James “Buster” Douglas, soon to become undisputed heavyweight champ, beat Tex on points. Cobb met Michael Dokes in a rematch and dropped a four-round technical decision. Tex lost his next two fights, a verdict to Eddie Gregg and a one round kayo to a club fighter named Dee Collier.

Tex Cobb was on the slide and took 1986 off to regroup. It was about time: “I figure I’ve been hit in the head with everything ‘cept a ‘54 Pontiac.”

Tex made the inevitable comeback in 1987. He racked up nine wins in a row without a loss, setting up the March 1, 1988, bout in Memphis, Tennessee against ex-titleholder Leon Spinks. Although near exhaustion at the end, Tex hung on to squeak out a ten-round point decision over the aged former champion.

Even though Tex said “It never bothers me to hit people I like,” getting hit by people he liked was another story, so he took a second hiatus, this time for three years, after his fight with Neon Leon.

Cobb made another comeback in 1992, scoring a first round TKO against Paul Barch, in a bout that was shrouded in controversy. Barch sold his side of a sordid story to Sports Illustrated, claiming he went into the soup for Tex while both men were high on cocaine. Cobb denied everything and sued the magazine for libel. Tex won the lawsuit, which was overturned on appeal, but it was definitely case closed when he uttered these immortal words: “It’s one thing to call me white and slow. But to call me a fat, cowardly, cocaine-snorting, fight fixing cheat? Who are they calling fat?”

Tex continued to soldier on. He won his last eight fights, the final one on May 7, 1993. Cobb retired with a record of 43-7-1 (36 KOs).

“I’m not standing up for the great state of Texas or the state of the white race or any of that,” Cobb said. “I’m a guy making a living.”

Tex had a second career in Hollywood, part of which ran concurrently when he was fighting, but he and LA were like snake oil and water.

“I find it a drag being sensitive twelve hours a day,” he said. “I’ve got thirty minutes of sensitivity in me in the morning, thirty minutes in the evening and that’s it. I’m more at home kicking butt.”

Despite his attitude, perhaps because of it, Tex Cobb was a character actor in demand for several years. He has over two-dozen TV and film appearances to his credit, including appearances in The X Files, Miami Vice, In the Heat of the Night, Married...with Children, Uncommon Valor, Raising Arizona, The Champ, Golden Child, Police Academy 4, Diggstown, Naked Gun 33 1/3 and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.

“People always ask if success is going to change me,” said Cobb, “and I tell them I sure hope so.”

Being on the west coast, instead of the east coast where he now lives, had some advantages.

“Hollywood’s a great place to vacation, but I wouldn’t want to live there. The people don’t have a concept of reality,” the former contender said. “Their reality is how good they pretend.”

But since Cobb was acting for a living, pretending in LA became a way of life.

“I love acting,” Cobb said. “It’s easy for me. All you do is look in the camera, smile, and lie with charm. I learned how to do that watching Don King promote fights.”

Many people have it out for Don King, and vice-versa, and it sounds like Cobb might be one of them: “Don King is one of the great humanitarians of our time. He has risen above that great term prejudice. He has screwed everybody he has ever been around. Hog, dog or frog, it don’t matter to Don. If you got a quarter, he wants the first twenty-six cents.”

Tex was never champion, but he got to deal with the top rank of the game.

“Don King is like everybody else in boxing. He’s a liar, a thief, a murderer and a racketeer. And a con man. But there ain’t anybody as bad as Bob Arum. That New York City Jew lawyer will make you hate city folks, Jews, and lawyers in the same day.”

Randall “Tex” Cobb is alive and well and exercising his right to remain silent in Philadelphia.