Times of ‘Tyson’: James Toback’s Heavyweight Documentary

Writer/director James Toback has had a long career making movies about his obsessions. He penned the James Caan film The Gambler, which was based on Toback's pension for gambling. He wrote and directed The Pick-Up Artist starring Robert Downey Jr., which echoed his pre-occupation with the opposite sex. Toback also wrote and directed Harvard Man starring Adrian Grenier, which he loosely based on his LSD trip while attending Harvard University in the mid-60s. Toback is an auteur who makes thought-provoking and controversial films based on what he knows. That's why it's not surprising he wrote and directed a documentary on former heavyweight champ Mike Tyson -- one of the most controversial sports figures in history and someone Toback has known personally for 20 years. Tyson was praised at many film festivals, including Cannes where it received a standing ovation. Toback and Tyson pull no punches in this revealing film that delves much deeper than the familiar superficial headlines we’ve read over the years about Iron Mike.

You have known Mike Tyson for two decades. Tell me about your first meeting with him.
We met in the Museum of Natural History in New York City at about four in the morning when we were shooting The Pick-Up Artist. Brian Hamill had invited him to come by the set. Mike and I started talking about Jim Brown, because he had recognized my name from a conversation he had with Jim the week before. I used to live at Jim’s house. Mike had visited Jim, and they had talked about me and referred to my participation in the sort of wild scenes at his house. Mike said, “You’re the white guy who used to be in those orgies at Jim Brown’s house.” We started talking about that and boxing.

Then, at around five in the morning, shooting ended and Mike and I took a walk through Central Park. Somehow, the subject of my LSD flip-out when I was a sophomore in Harvard came up. I started describing my flip-out and what madness was like. Mike was fascinated by the notion of madness. What did it mean to flip-out? To go insane? To go crazy? After trying to articulate it, I did what I usually do when words fail, as they have to in trying to describe madness. I said, “Unfortunately, you would need to feel it in order to know what it’s like.” I could see that he was inordinately curious about it. Over the years, Mike and I spoke quite often and got friendly. We continued to see each other casually and talked about doing something cinematically.

You cast Tyson in Black and White, where he infamously slapped Robert Downey Jr. Was that the first time he was in one of your films?
Yes. When Mike got out of prison, I told him I was starting this movie called Black and White, which I was going to collaborate with the Wu-Tang Clan. He got all excited and wanted to do it. Downey had also just gotten out of rehab or jail. My intuition is that interesting people are more interesting right after they have suffered. It opens them up even further. I felt that both of them would be very good in the movie and good together. I asked Downey what he wanted to play, and he said, “Why don’t I play the gay husband of Brooke Shields?” I said, “Good. Why don’t you play the gay husband of Brooke Shields who hits on Mike Tyson?” It only occurred to Downey at the last minute to ask whether I had told Mike that he was going to hit on him. I said, “No.” Downey said, “What if he gets angry?” I said, “I would assume he would.” He said, “How far do you want me to take it?” I said, “Take it until he responds in the extreme.” Downey responded, “What if he kills me?” I said, “Well, I haven’t thought about that. I think it’s unlikely—no better than a 5% chance. But, at the rate you’re going, you’re going to end up dying in the parking lot of a motel in Culver City. So what would be better ... that or dying like this?” Downey cracked up and proceeded to provoke Mike at great lengths to smack him, choke him, slam him on the ground, and call him a “cum drinker.”

The thing that actually gave me the idea for this documentary is the scene after that in the gym, when Power of Wu-Tang Clan approaches Mike and asks for advice on whether or not he should murder the character played by Allan Houston. Mike typically gives conflicting advice on several channels. I say typically, because Mike’s got no filter. He speaks freely and spontaneously. And one of the things that makes him so mesmerizing in the film is that you get a sense of seeing right into the core of somebody without any false or sculpted presentation of himself.

Since you know Tyson so well, was it hard to stay objective as a filmmaker when you were doing the documentary?
I didn’t really need to be objective or subjective because I just let him go. When I edited the movie, I wasn’t conscious of trying to make him look his best or his worst ... I just allowed him to reveal himself, which he does without apparent effort in trying to make himself look good or bad. I think he comes off phenomenally well. But I think that’s because he is what he appears to be in the movie: an extremely complicated, fundamentally decent guy who has a core of psychotic capacity. The sort of multiple channels going on inside him are on display in the movie.

You didn’t interview any other people in Tyson’s life – trainers, commentators, or fighters. Why is that?
I didn’t want to make a ten-hour movie. I basically wanted to make a movie under two hours. And why would I rather hear what Teddy Atlas or Lenox Lewis or Kevin Rooney has to say about Tyson, than to watch and listen to Tyson himself? He is one of the most intriguing and complicated people on the planet. Why would one want to listen to what somebody infinitely less interesting says about him?

In interviewing Tyson, what was your biggest surprise?
My biggest surprise was how immediately he allowed himself to break down. The moment where he kind of chokes up when talking about Cus D’Amato and really starts to cry happened about five minutes into the first shot. I was completely taken aback by that. I thought that there would need to be, as there is almost always in any movie of any sort, a kind of warmup and sliding into rhythm. But I should have known that with Mike that would not be the case. He would just jump in with no transition, which is what happened.

Do you feel that Tyson has been unfairly portrayed in the media over the years?
The emphasis has been reductive. Given where Mike started and what he achieved, it’s quite remarkable. Particularly, to go to prison and to come out and do it again. To take someone of that complexity of mind of body of language and reduce him to one episode in one fight where he snapped and bit Evander Holyfield’s ear. And one episode in his personal life, which he insists is a false conviction on a rape charge. No one will obviously know except the two of them, but I believe him, and I certainly believe that he would have no reason to have lied to me privately over a 20-year period about that. But to take those two actions and basically try to reduce his entire life to that, which is what the general media perception has been, I would say it’s characteristic of the shorthand that is the easiest way for the media to function. It functions with sound bites and headlines. So those are kind of easy tags and people are always looking for—easy tags and bottom lines. It’s not just the media, it’s the way people have been conditioned to think in the current techno age.

What do you think is the biggest misconception about Tyson?
That he is a simple, dangerous brute. And if there is a second misconception, it’s that he is an intellectually and linguistically blunt and limited personality. One of the many things that shocks people when they come out of the movie is not just how articulate he is, but how articulate he is in his own fresh, original voice. That is to say, it’s not just that he is expressing himself well, it’s that he is doing it in a way that is very particular to him.

With your movie Two Girls and a Guy, you brought Robert Downey Jr. back into the limelight. Do you feel this documentary could do the same for Tyson?
I think it can and will. I think that already the people who have seen the movie, given the festivals and screenings it’s played at ... it’s probably going on 20,000 people. I would say that 98% of those people have come out with a transformed notion of Tyson. Let’s say that if each of them has told 10 or 15 people about it, even if some of them are not yet convinced until they see the film, I think the movie is well on its way to having that affect. Although it certainly isn’t the intention that I had in making the movie. That’s not why I set out to do it.

Why did you set out to do this film?
I thought that he was a fascinating individual whose life touches upon so many things of contemporary significance—race, sex, madness, crime, violence, and ambition. All themes central to any movie I do. He is almost a paradigm in all of those areas.

What do you feel is Tyson’s biggest strength?
Determination. A ferocious will. A desire to achieve the most he can achieve once he set himself a goal.

What do you think his biggest weakness is?
I would say probably his being oblivious to consequence. It think the severe trouble he has been in in his life has come from a lack of consideration of consequence.

What do you want people to walk away with after watching the documentary?
Ideally, a sense of emotional catharsis—that they have been moved in a way that surprises and alters them.

Photo: Brett Ratner