Ali: Well, as I understand, I’m Cassius Marcellus Clay, the sixth and my great-great grandfather was a Kentucky slave when he was named after some great Kentuckian, but Cassius Marcellus Clay is a great name in Kentucky. And uh, really, where, he was from, where it was all originated, I couldn’t tell ya, but since I reached a little fame in boxing, most people want to know where I’m-a from and uh, where did I get that name. But really, I haven’t really checked on that. So, I see that I’m gonna have to go look in the books Reporter: You have to look it up Ali: See what’s it all about now I’m getting the little interviews On screen interview with reporter He was born Cassius Clay Became MUHAMMAD ALI And IS WIDELY HAILED AS ONE OF THE GREATEST And most influential ATHLETES OF THE 20TH CENTURY. The THREE TIME HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION Possessed unrivaled speed and agility inside the ring And an unmatched wit and charisma outside of it. He would come to be celebrated all over the world - A symbol of tolerance and understanding But was militant and confrontational in his youth. HIS FIRST TITLE BOUT CAME IN 1964. FEW THOUGHT HE HAD MUCH OF A CHANCE Ali dancing in the ring / Ali shooting his mouth off outside of it Ali: I predict that tonight someone will die at ringside of shock! Lipsyte: In 1964, the champion was Sonny Liston. And he was absolutely unbeatable. Cassius Clay was a 7-1 underdog - which is enormous, prohibitive odds. The New York Times sent me down there with these instructions: As soon as I got to Miami, rent a car, drive back and forth between the arena where the fight was gonna’ be held and the nearest hospital so I would waste no time following Cassius Clay into intensive care. Shot of Liston fight (KO) / BUT CLAY DOMINATED THE FIGHT: HE ELUDED LISTON’S FISTS, AND BY THE SIXTH ROUND WAS HITTING THE CHAMPION VIRTUALLY AT WILL. Shots from fight (ANNOUNCERS) WHEN LISTON DIDN’T ANSWER THE BELL FOR THE SEVENTH ROUND, CLAY BECAME THE HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION OF THE WORLD. (ANNOUNCER) IT WAS CLEAR FROM THE VERY BEGINNING THAT CLAY WAS GOING TO BE A DIFFERENT KIND OF CHAMPION:- BRASH, OUTSPOKEN SOON AFTER HIS VICTORY, HE JOINED THE NATION OF ISLAM AND CHANGED HIS NAME TO MUHAMMAD ALI. BUT MANY PUBLICATIONS, INCLUDING THE NEW YORK TIMES CONTINUED TO CALL HIM CASSIUS. Shots from fight Lipsyte: I said to him, ‘Listen, sorry about this, but this is out of my control.’ And he patted me on the head and said, ‘Don’t worry, you’re just a little brother of the white power structure.’ Shots of “Cassius Clay” in NYT articles SOME ASKED IF HE MIGHT OFFICIALLY CHANGE IT AS A REPORTER DID IN THIS PRESS CONFERENCE CAPTURED BY KTVU NEWS CAMERAS. Reporter: You’ve thought about changing it legally to Muhammad? Ali: Legally? Le- How’s that, who would I have to Reporters: In court, the court. (laughter) Ali: Who would I have to face? Reporter: The judge. Ali: The judge is what color? Reporter: I don’t know. Ali: He’s white. Reporters: Probably. There are negro judges. Ali: So in other words, I’d have to ask a white man, ‘May I call myself Muhammad Ali, boss?’ On screen Lipsyte: He’s very sensitive about my rightful name. And in several very cruel fights, one with Floyd Patterson, one with Ernie Terrell, he tortured them. Didn’t knock them out when he could have, because he wanted to inflict more punishment, because they insisted on calling him Cassius Clay. On screen / shots from the two fights mentioned Ali: If Floyd dreamed he beat me, he’d apologize. He’d rather run through hell in a gasoline sport coat. On screen Lipsyte: He tortured Floyd. It was like a little boy picking the wings off a butterfly. And he would just, uh, he would just kind of punch Floyd, step back Shots from fight After Patterson, Ali defeated George Chuvalo in March 1966. And then Henry Cooper in a six round TKO in May. He knocked out Brian London in only three rounds in August, beat Carl Millenberger in 12 rounds in September, and defeated Cleveland Williams in three round technical knockout in November, in what many experts consider to be the most dominant performance in Ali’s career. Four months later, In a pre-fight with Howard Cosell and ABC sports Ali almost came to blows with Ernie Terrell. Shots from fights (Ali and Terrell argue) Lipsyte: Ernie Terrell, somehow got boxed into, you know, standing up for the establishment; and that was, you know, another terrible and ugly fight. This was the, mean and cruel streak. Shots from fight Rhoden: Terrell would not call him by his name, you wanna call him Cassius. And so what, he just punished him. (bell) He was like, ‘What’s my name? Howard Cosell: He said he’d humiliate him, I hardly think it’s necessary. Don’t you agree, Joe? “Joe”: (laughs) I don’t, I don’t know about that. I think that Clay can do what he wants to do in the ring. Shots from fight FINALLY, IN MARCH 1967, ALI DEFEATED ZORA FOLLEY. He had won 29 fights in six and a half years - ONE OF THE MOST EXTRAORDINARY RUNS IN HEAVYWEIGHT BOXING HISTORY. Although he didn’t know it at the time, IT WOULD BE THREE AND A HALF YEARS BEFORE HE FOUGHT AGAIN. WHEN ALI REFUSED INDUCTION INTO THE ARMED FORCES, THE STATE BOXING COMMISSIONS SUSPENDED HIM AND STRIPPED HIM OF HIS TITLE. Shots from fights Lipsyte: Wave after wave of TV reporter, radio reporter, they all came, you know, ‘You know in a few minutes, you’re gonna be, you know, in the front lines.’ And then black Muslims would come and they’d say, ‘Some cracka’ sergeant gonna’ drop a hand grenade down into your pants.’ Um, and he was wild, and he was exasperated. And late in the evening, I remember standing there, late in the evening, the last radio reporter comes and goes, ‘So champ, how do you feel about being re-classified and going to Vietnam? And then he said, ‘I ain’t got nothing against them viet cong.’ Then he spent the next couple of years backing that up. He refused to step forward to be drafted, he was stripped of his title, but he stood firm. Getty Archival / Lipsyte on screen Rhoden: The heavyweight champion of the world is telling people that you can take my belt, you can take my championship and that introduced a lot to courage, to honor, to valor, it was not just about running fast, jumping high, but what do you stand for? What are your morals, what are your principles? What’s stand would you take, what are you willing to risk? Rhoden on screen / Getty Archival Lipsyte: So for the next 3 and half years he couldn’t fight and he had to make a living mostly by um speaking engagements on college campuses. Ali at college speaking engagements Ali - “The purpose of war is to kill kill kill and keep on killing innocent people” Lipsyte: but you know in the course of that, in the Q and A’s after as they asked him political questions he was a quick study / he would kind of begin to understand you know the main threads of American life. Ali -“You my oppose when I want justice ...” Ali was never tried or even fined. He won his first appeal in 1970, When a federal court upheld his bid for a State license. He QUICKLY GOT BACK TO WORK BEATING JERRY QUARRY AND OSCAR BONAVENA. HIS CHANCE TO RECLAIM HIS TITLES CAME IN MARCH 1971, AGAINST HIS OLD FRIEND, JOE FRAZIER. IT WAS DUBBED THE FIGHT OF THE CENTURY. Shots from fights Sound UP - Ali and Frazier arguing Anderson: today now, 40 years later uh a lot of people because of their, their love of Ali, think Ali probably should have won that fight. Joe Frasier beat him up. / I can remember him saying, when a man gets me going that a real punch. And when he knocks me down that’s a REALL punch. And uh Joe Frasier had knocked him down. Anderson onscreen / Shots from fight IT WAS ALI’S FIRST PROFESSIONAL LOSS, But even though the decision was undisputed, He continued to talk trash about Joe Frazier Every chance he got. Wherever he might be. Ali defeated a dethroned Joe Frazier in January 1974, But his next championship bout wasn’t until ten months later When he squared off against GEORGE FOREMAN, IN A MATCH IN ZAIRE DUBBED, THE RUMBLE IN THE JUNGLE. Anderson: most people, including myself thought Foreman would demolish him. / there were 60, 000 people a soccer stadium in the middle of Africa. / yelling Ali boom-eye-aye. What that meant was Ali, kill him, because he was their guy. Anderson onscreen / Shots from fight Ali - 100,00 Africans screaming “Ali-boom-aye-yay .....” And he could- one reason was that Ali had told them that Foreman was a Belgian. For years it was the Belgian Congo. Belgium, that- was a colony for Belgium. So the name-the citizens there hated Belgium. So when Ali told them that Foreman was Belgian, he wasn’t of course, but when he told them that, they wanted to believe that Foreman was the enemy. Rhoden: that fight was just masterful. / he you know he just blew foreman’s mind you know. He completely as mush as one competitor could completely turn someone inside out- Ali had completely turned foreman inside out. Rhoden onscreen / Shots from fight Anderson: He would back off into the ropes and let Foreman pummel him. He would cover up like this, and foreman would just smash his ribs and everything. And then Ali would skirt away and bounce away, and finally Foreman just kind of punched himself out. Then Ali threw a right hand in the 8th round. And Foreman actually spun. Cause I was sitting there and looked up and Foreman spun and went down and just had no energy to get up. And Ali again now was the champion, with 3 years after he had lost the first year, and now suddenly everybody loved him. Anderson onscreen / Shots from fight After Foreman, Ali quickly dispatched Chuck Wepner and then Ron Lyle. A few months later, he flew to Malaysia To defend his tile against Joe Bugner. Anderson: (boxing gloves story) Lipsyte: (King of all Kings story) Lipsyte: people say well the great- he called himself the greatest, the prettiest that was just kind of box office. Eh, I don’t think so. I think that he, he uh, he did have this grandiosity about him and he, he was a narcissist. / there were some parts of him which can’t avoid / he was always available uh to fight. In some of the worse dictatorships in the world. Uh, he was enthralled to Don king, a criminal. Um there were kind of really kind of dark parts of him. But perhaps the darkest uh, was the a kind of a vicious attack on Joe Frazier. Calling him an uncle Tom and making fun of his looks. You know, calling him you know a gorilla, uh and I will, I will beat the gorilla in the thrilla in manila. FRAZIER SUPPORTED ALI’S RIGHT NOT TO SERVE IN THE VIETNAM WAR. HE TESTIFIED ON HIS FRIEND’S BEHALF BEFORE CONGRESS. EVEN LENT HIM MONEY WHEN ALI WASN’T FIGHTING. BUT WHAT STARTED AS A FRIENDLY RIVALRY IN THE RING BECAME SOMETHING ALTOGETHER DIFFERENT Frazier was hurt and angry WHEN THEY FACED OFF FOR THE THIRD TIME IN THE PHILIPPINES. Images of Fazier supporting Ali Anderson: The fight in Manila / god it had to be 100 degrees in that arena. And, and it was a brutal fight. Brutal I mean I, I called it an epic in brutality. And it was. I mean you couldn’t there was never a slow moment I mean the punches were brutal. And also by that time, four years after the first fight in the garden they were older and slower, they really couldn’t get out of each other’s way so every punch landed. / it stopped in the 15th round by Joe Frasier’s trainer because / his left eye had been closed and he couldn’t see- the trainer said he couldn’t see Ali’s right hand punches coming. So he stopped it. Even though he thought Frasier was ahead. Eddie Fudge was one of the great boxing trainers of all time and he stopped the fight because he didn’t; want Joe to get hurt. And maybe- who knows what. / One of the first questions, if not the first somebody said to him, what a brutal fight, what was it like in that ring? And I’ll never forget, all Ali said was “it was next to death.” Anderson onscreen / Shots from fight Frazier lost to Foreman again And then retired. Ali fought TEN MORE TIMES Defeating COOPMAN YOUNG DUNN NORTON EVANGELISTA SHAVERS He lost his title to Leon SPINKS in 1978 won it back later that year. And lost it for the last time to Larry HOLMES in 1980. But still Ali fought on He retired AFTER LOSING TO TREVOR BURBICK ON DECEMBER 11, 1981, A LITTLE OVER A MONTH BEFORE HIS 40th BIRTHDAY. TWO YEARS LATER, DAVE ANDERSON CAUGHT UP WITH HIM BEFORE ALI LEFT ON A GOOD-WILL TOUR. Shots from fights Anderson: He was probably a few pounds heavy, so he was- was going through some training, just light training. But something to get the weight off. In a gym in Miami, his great trainer Angelo Dundee was with him. And then afterwards we spoke- there were about 4 or 5 writers there and I remember that’s the first time I noticed he was slurring his words. I mean it was very uh very apparent. You couldn’t miss it. / to get, get the readers’ appreciation of how serious that was. I put the words together. / I mean it was, it was sad to hear him do that. And as we all know it got worse and worse and worse and worse. Anderson onscreen / image from NYT article of words running together ALI’S DECLINE WAS AS RAPID AS IT WAS DRAMATIC. HE APPEARED IN PUBLIC LESS AND LESS FREQUENTLY AS TIME WENT ON, BUT DESPITE HIS OBVIOUS DIFFICULTIES, HE NEVER LOST HIS SPARK Misc public appearances / Atlanta Olympics Rhoden: I saw him was at the Olympics in Sydney Australia, by this time the Parkinson’s it, it began to ravish him. But I remember meeting him uh, at some event and it was again it was a small gathering and so um, you know, I introduced myself- re-introduced myself to him. And I said, he said- by this time- he said “what, what’s your name?” and I said my name is Bill Rhoden. He said no, no, what’s your real name? Stills of Sydney olympics Ali: Muhammad means one who’s worthy of all praises and one who’s praise worthy and Ali means the most high, but Clay only meant only dirt with no ingredients, see. Ali onscreen Ali: “what’s my name!?” Patterson or turell fight