Frank Skinner on Muhammad Ali

I love boxing.

It's competition stripped down to absolute basics.

One fighter against another battling for pride, reputation,

and the simple right to say, "I beat you."

For me, and for a lot of people,

the greatest of them all was Muhammad Ali.

In the brutish world of heavyweight boxing, he was an artist,

dancing around the ring with incredible grace and speed.

And he wasn't just a sportsman. He was a man of principle,

a civil rights activist and a born entertainer.

The angel food cake is the white cake,

and the devil food cake is the chocolate cake.

One of the things that really got me into the idea of comedy

was watching Ali.

ALI HUMS THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER

I mean, properly funny.

Tarzan is the king of the jungle in Africa.

He was white.

I saw this white man swinging around Africa with a diaper on,

howling...

HE IMITATES TARZAN

I've read loads of books about Ali, watched all his fights...

I've quite literally bought the T-shirt.

I met him briefly as a starstruck fanboy, but never got the chance to

talk to him properly before his death.

But now I have an opportunity to really find out about him.

I'm going to see for myself some of the places Muhammad Ali lived

and worked.

It's a bit like a little version of Camelot, with Ali as King Arthur.

I'm going to meet the people who knew him...

People would stand and applaud, and he hadn't said a word!

..his family, friends and colleagues.

Welcome to the Holmes' residence.

The home of the real champion.

-How are you, Frank? How you doing? Come on in.

-Good to see you.

I'm going to find out what it was like to be around

one of the most famous human beings who ever lived.

So stay tuned and see the Greatest Of All Time.

This is the house that I grew up in, in fact

I spent the first 20 years of my life in this house.

-RADIO:

-'The bell for round one.

'Clay going into the centre of the ring.

'Dancing a, sort of, contemptuous dance...'

It was in our old kitchen when I was five or six years old that my dad

first introduced me to Muhammad Ali.

Back in those days he was still known as Cassius Clay.

'A right cross by Clay catches Liston high up on the head.'

My dad would come and...

..in the middle of the night...

..little tap on the bedroom door.

"Come on."

It was so exciting to wake up in the early hours and we would

come downstairs in the dark, put the light on in here,

and he'd get the radio.

And we'd be ready for the Cassius Clay fight.

We had an armchair and a sofa in here,

because we lived in the kitchen.

The front room was for best, obviously.

And I never would sit on the sofa with my dad,

because when my dad listened to a fight he listened to it like this...

So if you sat too close to my dad

you might actually recreate what was happening in the ring.

We were hearing something that was happening in America,

which seemed like as far away as you could possibly go,

and we were in our little kitchen, in Oldbury, in the West Midlands,

just a son and his father sharing this excitement.

It was really...

..special.

'A right hand by Clay and Liston is down.'

Now, 50 years later, I've come to the city of Louisville, Kentucky

where Cassius Clay was born in 1942.

This was always a magical place to me

because I grew up thinking this to be a mythical spot.

You know, the Louisville Lip, Ali was known as,

so you couldn't forget where he came from.

And there's a quote from Ali that I always remember,

after he beat Liston, he shouted, "I shook up the world."

And that comes back to me a lot when

I read about him and think about him

and watch his fights. And I like beginnings.

I like the idea of going to where that tiny seed began

that shook up the world.

The...the tiny seed from which the mighty oak tree grew.

Clay lived with his parents and his younger brother in this street,

Grand Avenue.

If I was to picture the birthplace of the average boxer,

it probably wouldn't look quite like this.

"The Clay family was part of the

"black middle class of West End Louisville..."

The house, I have to say, is...

..is a nice house.

A pink wooden house.

And all of these things are relative,

but most boxers that you read about,

they've had it really tough.

It wasn't like that with Ali, I don't think.

He wasn't a street fighter in the ring.

That's not what he was.

He was an artist.

He had a beauty about it.

And maybe he just had enough room in his life for beauty.

It wasn't all about the hard grind of coming up from the very bottom.

They always say boxers have to be hungry,

and I'm not sure he was ever hungry.

Maybe slightly peckish.

So, what, if anything,

marked out young Cassius from the other kids in this neighbourhood?

Were there any signs of future greatness?

I'm going to have a chat to his neighbours, the Montgomery family,

who knew him from boyhood.

-Good evening.

-Hi, hello.

-How are you?

-I'm good, thank you, very much.

-Step right in.

So, Lawrence, Violet, Karen, you used to live across the road,

directly next door to the Clay...

-Right next door, yes, we did.

-..family.

And when would that have been?

You were living there in the '50s and '60s?

-That was in the '50s, yes.

-OK.

So what kind of area was this, then?

Well, we had doctors and lawyers,

principals and teachers and all right here in this block

along with the Clays and the Montgomerys.

What was Cassius like as a boy?

Could you see something special?

Did he have that personality then?

That vibrancy?

Well, you know, I don't think he was any different from any other child

around the neighbourhood.

But he was dedicated to boxing.

He always had me to hold my hands up so he could shadow-box in my hands.

He told me... He said,

"Lawrence, I'm gonna be the Heavyweight Champion Of The World."

I said, "Boy, you're crazy.

"Don't even think about it."

He was small.

I said, "You have to be a huge man to be a heavyweight, you know?"

But Cassius wasn't deterred.

By the time he'd reached his teens he was well on his way to becoming

a professional boxer.

He won state contests, then national amateur titles.

Had he been born in another era he might have been happy to just devote

his life to sport, but this was the '50s

in the midst of racial segregation.

This area, I mean, Louisville in general,

at that time there was segregation here.

Absolutely.

There were certain restaurants that black people couldn't eat in.

-Most of the restaurants.

-Schools...

-Really?

-If the whites used it...

I mean, the women couldn't even go into the stores

on 4th Street and try on clothes.

We could buy them, but we couldn't try them on.

-What?

-That's true.

That was the rule?

-That was the rule.

-That's so crazy.

I never even thought that it would, sort of, split down...

I thought you were either in or out.

Segregation infected every aspect of Kentucky life in the '50s.

Cassius and his brother were educated

in separate schools from whites,

they couldn't play in the same parks or sit next to white children in

the cinema or the library.

In the 1960 Olympics in Rome, Cassius Clay won a gold medal

and returned to America in triumph.

He walked into a white-owned restaurant in Louisville,

assuming he'd be welcomed as the conquering hero.

But it didn't work out that way, as he explained many years later.

I took my gold medal. I thought I'd invented something.

I said, "Man, I know I'm going to get my people freedom.

"I am the champion of the whole world.

"Olympic champion! I can eat downtown now!"

And I went downtown that day, I had my big old medal on,

and I went in the restaurants.

At that time things weren't integrated.

The black folks couldn't eat downtown.

And I went downtown I sat down, and I said, you know, "A cup of coffee.

"A hot dog..."

The lady said, "We don't serve Negroes."

I was so mad I said, "I don't eat them either!

"Just give me a cup of coffee and a hamburger!"

AUDIENCE APPLAUDS

MUSIC: Black Night Is Falling by John Lee Hooker

# Oh, how I hate to be... #

Ali was so disgusted by how he'd been treated by white America that

he came here, to the Second Bridge in Louisville,

and hurled his gold medal into the Ohio River.

Or did he?

# I keep crying for my baby...#

I've heard conflicting stories.

Some people say he lost it,

others that he gave it to a girl.

I'd love to find out what really happened,

so I'm off to meet someone who knows.

Rahman Ali is Muhammad Ali's only brother.

A talented boxer himself, he and Ali trained together as men and boys.

When Ali found fame Rahman joined the entourage

and was never far from his brother's side.

Rahman, it seems to me that being Muhammad Ali's brother would be the

most exciting thing...

-It is.

-..in the world.

-You said the right thing.

I feel so honoured and overjoyed and happy just to be his brother.

He's a wonderful, wonderful, sweet man. A kind man.

So you were Muhammad's sparring partner.

-Yes, I was. I gave him a real good workout.

-Yeah?

I was his best sparring partner.

When you are in the entourage, apart from being a sparring partner,

what were your other... What I else did you do for Muhammad?

Protected my brother.

I just watched him. Make sure nobody tried to stab him or hurt him.

-Oh, so you were a bodyguard as well?

-Yes, bodyguard as well.

I've had a fantastic life!

-There's a question I have ask you, Rahman.

-Ask me anything.

-OK.

Did your brother throw his Olympic medal off

the Second Bridge into the Ohio River?

I've got something to tell you about that.

I know the truth, but sometimes it's not a good thing to speak the truth.

Surely, it's always good to speak the truth?

What did Muhammad... What did he say?

He said he threw it in.

Then he did.

Then he did.

But I think he also said you were there.

No comment.

So, is it worth me getting on a scuba-diving suit and

-looking in the river for that medal?

-No.

-OK.

You might get drowned.

-You might get drowned.

-I might, that's true.

-I'm telling the truth.

-OK.

I'm no nearer knowing the truth about the medal.

Like many things in his life

this incident will probably stay shrouded in mystery.

Which is, I suspect, just how Ali wanted it.

Oh, hold on.

Oh, I thought that was, erm,

Muhammad Ali's gold medal from the 1960 Olympics.

It's actually a plastic burger.

This story, the medal off the bridge, might not be factually true,

but it has tremendous truth in it.

It just reminds us that even when he achieved gold medal for America,

he still went back and wasn't treated like an equal American.

And that tells us the truth of segregation,

and tells us about something that was so central to what Ali became.

Cassius Clay's stratospheric rise continued.

In the next few years not only did he win every fight,

but he often managed to predict in

which around he would actually beat his opponent.

I'm planning to reveal the round and the minute,

and I will tell you the second if I knew

how long it would take the referee to

get Sonny in position and start counting.

But no amount of success would change Clay's place in society.

And that's something he just couldn't stomach.

In 1964, after a decisive six round win over Sonny Liston,

Clay became heavyweight champion.

In the press frenzy that followed the fight he made an announcement

that shocked the world.

He revealed that he'd become a member of the radical Muslim group,

the Nation Of Islam,

and would be changing his name to Muhammad Ali.

Cassius Clay was my slave name. I'm no longer a slave.

What does it mean?

Muhammad means worthy of all praises, and Ali means most high.

Led by the charismatic Elijah Muhammad,

the Nation of Islam promoted black pride, self empowerment,

and, controversially, the complete separation of blacks and whites.

It was an uncompromising message which horrified white America.

They boast about what they have, and what they will deprive us of.

I say, "The earth belongs to the black man."

It was through the Nation of Islam that Ali met the daughter of one of

Elijah Muhammad's lieutenants.

-Hey, Frank.

-Khalilah...

How are you, Frank? How are you doing? Come on in.

Good to see you.

She's Khalilah Camacho-Ali,

and I'm here to talk about her courtship

and marriage to "The Greatest".

Do you think the Nation of Islam

provided Muhammad with a, sort of, home.

Yeah.

He was going to gain a religion,

he was going to gain respect and honour. All of that.

He was going to gain a good way of life.

-I'm going to be completely honest with you now...

-Yes.

..as a young kid back in England,

we used to think the Nation of Islam...

I hadn't heard of it before Muhammad joined.

We used to think it was a pretty scary organisation.

You know what, in the beginning it was the poorest of the poor.

The people who had lost their self-esteem from the slavery.

And that's the only people who would join Elijah Muhammad at that time.

We liked the learning of who we are, where we came from,

and how to grow out of the slavery mentality.

So it kind of gave you back your identity, really?

It did, it did.

Khalilah met Muhammad Ali while she was still at school.

But they were little more than acquaintances.

As she grew into a beautiful young woman their relationship became

something more.

So, tell me about the love, Khalilah.

I want to know how that happened.

How did you come to marry Muhammad Ali?

-Did you and him go out on dates...

-No.

-..before?

Muslim relationships are not long.

I mean, you decided to marry somebody, you'd get married.

I mean, you don't fool around.

You don't play around.

You can't... You know, there's no sex before marriage.

This is our first date, right here.

As a matter of fact, I'm autographing this to you, Frank.

-That's beautiful.

-I'll give this to you.

-I was 16, he was 24.

-OK.

So... This was in 1966.

And we got married in 1967.

One year.

Now, you don't see the four guys my dad sent with us on the date, right?

-Chaperones?

-Chaperones, definitely.

I was... I was...

-I was surprised he didn't send more.

-OK.

-So, to be honest with you, I was the only virgin he ever married.

-OK.

This would be no typical celebrity marriage.

Khalilah became Mrs Ali while her husband was in the midst of a

high-profile scandal.

The Vietnam War was raging,

and, like thousands of other young American men, Ali had been called up

to serve in the army.

MUSIC: Handsome Johnny by Richie Haven

# Marching to the fields of Vietnam

# Looks like Handsome... #

But he refused to be drafted,

arguing that his Muslim faith prevented him from fighting.

And this will all be denouncing

and defying everything that I stand for.

This would mean, of course,

that you stand the chance of going

to jail as the result of not going into service.

Well, whatever the punishment,

whatever the persecution is for

standing up for my religious beliefs,

even if it means facing machine gun fire,

that day I will face it before denouncing

Elijah Muhammad and the religion of Islam.

I'm ready to die.

The authorities response was swift.

It took an all-white jury less than a half-hour to find Muhammad Ali

guilty of all charges and specifications.

He was sentenced by federal judge Joe Ingraham to the maximum,

five years in prison, and was fined 10,000.

Ali was given the maximum sentence for refusing the draft,

he was stripped of the heavyweight title and banned from boxing.

But if the authorities thought they could silence Ali they were wrong.

His outspokenness on Vietnam and racial relations in America made him

a hero for the civil rights movement.

While his legal team appealed his sentence,

Ali stayed out of prison and took his message to university campuses

across the country.

When you look at television and see these two cars,

one black and one white, and they put a gallon of gas in each one...

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

..to see which car can go the farthest.

And every time the black car stops first and the white car keeps going.

So this brainwashes the Negroes...

During his break from boxing he did lots of talks to students.

Talks that you would call, I suppose,

black power talks, they would have been called then.

And when he gets his first laughs, you see his face illuminate.

And even as a civil rights activist, Ali is still loving the laughs.

Then he goes to the drugstore.

He orders two dips of ice cream,

he says I want a dip of chocolate, a dip of vanilla.

And every time they put the chocolate on the bottom

and the vanilla on the top.

And sometimes, when he talked about white people he sounded, like,

white guys I heard in pubs talking about black people.

It sounded like bigotry.

But when he combines the message with the Ali magic, it is...

it's brilliant.

The campus talks weren't the only way Ali got his message out during

his ban from boxing.

I made the trip to a wintry New York to find out about an episode in

Ali's life I've always been curious about.

In 1969 he starred in a black power musical called Buck White.

And I tracked down his co-star, Charles Weldon.

You had a rehearsal period with him, presumably?

Yeah, we had four weeks rehearsal

and I remember him always being there.

Oh, he showed up regularly?

-Oh, yeah.

-OK.

-Ali was a great... He was a great cast member.

He was... When Ali was with us in rehearsals he was just another guy.

He was not...

Muhammad Ali.

He wore a wig and a beard.

-Yeah, he hated it.

-Did he?

He wasn't into wigs, you know.

We would be singing his entrance song, which was a song that went...

# Big time, Buck White!

# Big time, Buck White. #

And he would come down the aisle, and people would stand and applaud.

And he hadn't said a word, you know.

You know, I first came here some 400 long years ago.

And at the end of the first act,

we would run around the stage like

we were burning stuff, throwing stuff,

and Ali would always be right in the middle,

-shadow-boxing.

-Oh, really?

So our thing was, like, "Don't get close to him!"

You could still actually feel the wind from his sparring.

Wow!

Do you think Ali could act?

He would have grown into a very good actor, I think, you know.

Because he did this part very well.

He really did this part very well.

Did he... Was he nervous about performing?

No. He was never nervous.

He was, you know, he would sometimes forget his lines,

and he would lean over and whisper in my ear, "What's my line?"

And I would tell him his line, and he would just move right along.

# We came in chains

# And now your choice must be... #

The initial flurry of interest in Ali

didn't result in big ticket sales.

The show soon closed, partly, Charles believes,

because of Ali's notoriety.

It didn't run long simply because it was Muhammad Ali

and there was a certain amount of people

who were not going to be a part

of this guy who was going against going to Vietnam.

You know, he was a draft dodger,

but I'll say one thing about Muhammad Ali...

..I never remember him mentioning that at all.

He was just a fun guy to be around with.

He never mentioned his problems.

But Ali's problems had become headline news across the world.

Back in Britain a bare knuckle boxer called Paddy Monaghan took it upon

himself to mount a one-man support campaign.

He started a petition protesting the ban,

that got over 20,000 signatures.

He organised a fan club and wrote letters to Richard Nixon and the

American Embassy.

It's an extraordinary story,

and I'm off to hear more about it from Paddy himself,

and his son, Tyrone.

I think it must have been strange for Ali -

who must have felt, as we know,

pretty embattled at the time and maybe a bit lonely in a way -

to know that out in England there was a guy fighting his corner.

Paddy. How did it happen for you and Muhammad Ali?

I'm right that you started a petition?

First of all, what was that about?

I had no schooling,

but we knew right from wrong.

They had no right whatsoever to take the guy's title away.

So then what happened?

Muhammad then sent a letter,

saying he was coming over to the...

Is it the Royal Lancaster Hotel?

-..in London,...

-Yeah, the Royal Lancaster.

That's where you first met him.

They did a tour of London together.

Muhammad Ali, you have said that one of your biggest fans has been a lad

called Paddy Monaghan, if we can bring Paddy in.

Because Paddy lives in our area.

Just how much of a fan is Paddy Monaghan?

Well, he's one of my number one fans in the Britain area, here.

I have many fans and he's one of the top-notch fans here.

He's protesting. When they took my title,

carrying signs at the airport.

He started a Muhammad Ali fan club all on his own.

Paddy, what has been the attraction to you about Muhammad Ali?

Well, the man himself. He's taught me a lot. I've watched him.

I've learned from him.

His principles - simple as that.

It's not just the boxer, it's the man.

And this meeting wasn't the end of it.

Ali invited Paddy to come and visit him in America.

So you went, obviously?

-Who wouldn't?

-Well, I thought about it.

I was so busy.

FRANK LAUGHS

So where did you stay? Did he put you in a hotel?

I was at his place.

-In his house?

-In his house, yeah. Yeah.

So you'd get up for breakfast in the morning and Muhammad Ali would

-be sitting there having his cornflakes.

-Yeah, yeah.

Me too. I trained with him, I sparred with him.

Sparred with him in the 5th St Gym.

Why did you bond so much, you and him?

He's the sort of guy, he didn't give a damn about anything.

And he knew...

that I was the same.

We were both the same.

He must have had a, sort of, quiet down time.

If he had a quiet downtime, you tell me about it.

True as God is my judge, he was the same Ali as what we see on TV.

He was the same man all the time.

Paddy had the kind of access to Muhammad Ali that fans like me can

only dream about.

And Ali was happy to spend time with Paddy and his family in their

council house in Oxfordshire.

Over the years he visited more than a dozen times.

And this is your old house?

Yeah, it is, yeah. This is where we used to live and Muhammad...

It's interesting to imagine Muhammad Ali arriving here.

No disrespect to your house.

Not many people ever get to be as famous as him

even amongst the famous.

But they wouldn't come here, if you know what I mean.

No, no. Way back here, when he used to come...

I mean this... Saxton Road was notorious.

I mean, you see it now. It was notorious way back then.

The only time the police came down here, I think it was in riot vans!

-Really?

-Yeah, seriously. They'd have the big black shield

coming down over the windscreen.

When he visited the crowd was so big

-that the police was, obviously, called in for crowd control.

-Really?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was absolutely amazing.

And would he arrive on his own?

No, mainly with an entourage.

But we had a fence here then, and there was people,

I don't know how many,

but there was quite a few. They had makeshift tents.

My mum was bringing them out tea and coffee.

They were staying two or three nights until Muhammad came back.

It's like a, sort of, Muhammad Ali festival.

Yeah, yeah.

Another time he'd come in here, me and him would be out there.

I don't know if I've got this one here...

we'd be sparring, shadow-boxing.

-You shadow-boxed?

-Yeah.

You're in pretty good shape, if you don't mind me saying.

I was then. That's us with the gloves on, out the back garden.

"Tyrone," he says, "do you want to do some sparring?"

I thought, "Oh, yeah! Let's get it on, you know!"

And that one, that's one with Muhammad leaving the house.

-They hugged each other.

-That's beautiful.

I remember him calling my dad, "You're my friend and brother."

That's real affection.

Yeah, it is. There's my dad and Ali, just there, look.

-He's doing the Joe Frazier, isn't he?

-Yeah, Joe Frazier.

Yeah, he's right down. He's in his crouch.

Do you want to do a little bit, Frank?

How about you being Ali? I'll be Frazier.

Do you know what, I was going to insist on being Ali.

-You going to be Ali?

-You look more like Frazier to me.

Let's move about a little bit.

Remember, the emphasis on shadow.

-Well, we're just touching, not even touching.

-OK.

-That's it.

And we're going around that way. He kept saying, "Come on, sucker."

My dad's coming in like that, as Frazier. He's coming in.

-"I'm going to get you, sucker."

-You big ugly bear!

-I didn't mean that, by the way.

-No, no, it's OK.

While Ali made friends in England,

back in America his legal case rumbled on.

A full three years after the ban was imposed his lawyers made a stunning

discovery while trawling the records of the US Boxing Commission.

The commission refused to give Ali a licence,

because they didn't want a convicted felon in professional boxing.

Can you imagine such a thing?

Unsurprisingly, his council investigated the commission's record

to see if any other convicted felons had been professional boxers.

They found at least 244 instances in recent years

where licences had been granted to convicted felons,

these convictions included, let me see, second-degree murder, burglary,

armed robbery, extortion, grand larceny, rape, sodomy, embezzlement,

arson, and receiving stolen property.

Possession of narcotics, attempted rape, assault and battery, fraud,

impairing the morals of a minor, possession of burglar's tools,

and desertion from the

Armed Forces of the United States.

The case against Ali fell apart and his sentence was overturned.

MUSIC: War by Edwin Starr

# What is it good for

# Absolutely nothing... #

And with support for the war disappearing

Ali's views were increasingly

in step with the new revolutionary mood in America.

In 1970, Ali, by now a 28-year-old father of three,

had his boxing licence renewed.

His ambition was to win back the heavyweight title from the man who'd

taken it in his absence, Smokin' Joe Frazier.

Joe Frazier will go down!

I have made my prediction, and it will be released.

I'll show you.

-I gotta go now.

-Muhammad.

-Are we going to go for it?

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.

Oh! Rumble, young man, rumble. Oh!

The match was dubbed the fight of the century.

MUSIC: Give The People What They by O'Jays

A star-studded crowd filled Madison Square Garden

and the worldwide TV audience was over 300 million.

Ali told the papers,

"People want to see me whipped because I'm arrogant,

"because of the draft, because of my religion...

"..but I thrive on pressure.

"I'll win easy."

The stage had been set.

The king had come back from his travels,

from his battles and his wars, to retain his crown.

And it didn't quite happen.

The fight went the distance, but Frazier won unanimously on points.

The thing that sticks in my mind is the last round.

When Frazier found this left hook, and Ali went down.

It was the way that as he landed his feet went up in the air in a

real ugly shape.

It was like a man being thrown back from an explosion.

And it was so shocking to see Ali go down like that.

To be so graceless.

Anyway, because it was an Ali-Frazier fight, obviously,

both men went into hospital afterwards.

But when me and my dad back in the

West Midlands read the newspaper reports,

we managed to work out in our minds that maybe Ali HAD won the fight.

We were wrong first time, we hadn't really thought about it.

And it was an American conspiracy to

keep the loud-mouthed draft dodger down.

So, in our house, he was still "The Greatest".

For Ali too, defeat to Frazier was just a temporary setback.

Determined to regain his heavyweight title

he were retreated to the country

to his training camp in Deer Lake, Pennsylvania.

Now you'll see this sign here that says, "Deer Lake, 2 miles"?

See, even the sign gives me a bit of a tingle.

That's just the sign!

'The camp is such a big part of the

'Ali mythology I can hardly believe it's real.

'But Lynda Schiffer whose father sold Ali the original plot of land

'is driving me there.'

Now we are entering Deer Lake.

-This building, straight ahead...

-OK.

..which would be Ali's personal cabin.

And that's where he stayed when he was here.

The rocks to my left, Ali's dad painted all of these names.

They're all fighters, all boxers.

I love the inspirational rocks.

When I think of Deer Lake it's those rocks I always think of

with the champions on.

So, I imagined when Ali came here

that the idea was that he just shut himself away, and didn't really...

-Oh, no.

-No?

-Oh, no.

There were always people around him.

And to the left would be the kitchen.

-Be careful, there's ice here.

-Oh, OK.

Let me give you a hand up there, Lynda.

Thank you very much.

Oh, but aren't you going to help me?

I'm kidding. SHE LAUGHS

Wow.

So, this is the kitchen area.

There's some wonderful pictures here.

-So, your dad met Ali...

-Mm-hmm.

..how did you get from that first meeting...

to suddenly Ali is buying property from you?

Well, my father said to Ali one day,

"You know, I have the perfect spot.

"It's fresh air,

"it's backcountry roads.

"The air's good for you, the food's good,"

-and he just tweaked his interest, I guess.

-Yeah.

And up they came, and Ali liked what he saw.

So these would have been communal meals in here?

-Yes.

-I like the, sort of, pioneer cabin feel.

It has a lot of charm, I think.

I can imagine the sort of communal atmosphere here.

It's a bit like a little version of Camelot with Ali as King Arthur.

And then the Knights Of The Rectangular Table.

When you're at a place like this, I think,

what you can't help but think about is, sort of, "Team Ali".

The fact that every fighter who gets into the ring

is the tip of a pyramid,

and underneath him there are trainers, and masseurs, and cooks,

and sparring partners,

all with that single purpose of making him as good as he can be

on one given night.

And then that moment where they can't help him any more

once he steps into the ring - that's when the boxer is like

the loneliest person on earth.

MUSIC: The Boss by James Brown

# Paid the cost to be the boss

# Paid the cost to be the boss... #

At the centre of the camp was the gym.

This is where Ali, ever the showman,

welcomed in the public to watch him train with his sparring partners -

skilful, smart young boxers with something to prove.

One of these was Larry Holmes, aka The Eastern Assassin.

Welcome to the Holmes' residence.

The home of the real champion.

Come on in. Come on in, guys.

-Oh, man!

-All right.

I got Ali's over there.

And I got Joe Frazier over there.

Who's the guy in the middle?

Oh, this guy, that's when I was young, strong and skinny!

Oh, man. I loved Larry's house.

It was a museum to the noble art of self-defence.

Larry, I'm really excited to meet you.

I feel I can ten-year-old kid.

-It's great.

-Me too!

To meet you.

I just feel bad that I'm here talking to you about Muhammad Ali,

because you were an amazing champion,

and I need to acknowledge that from the start.

But I'd like to start, if I could,

with your career as a sparring partner.

If Ali hires you as a sparring partner, what does he want from you?

Well, because I had sparring partners,

and I know what I wanted from them,

I can tell you what Ali would expect from me.

Hard work. He wanted me put the pressure on him.

He wanted me to be similar to the guy he's fighting.

And he had different people around him to...

That's George Foreman, that's Joe Frazier,

and these guys emulate

George Foreman and Joe Frazier, of course. You know?

Would he be giving you his best shots in sparring?

Sometimes he'd get mad.

When the audience comes in, when there are people around,

then you're in trouble!

What's the money like for a...

Was he paying you good money for sparring?

He was giving me 500 a week.

And he could have given me 100 a week, I didn't care. I...

I enjoyed the excitement of being with Muhammad Ali.

And people used to say, "You're crazy."

-He's going to kill you.

-Hmm.

I said, "Well, at least I'm getting killed

"by one of the greatest guys in the world."

So he wasn't just, a sort of, boss-employee relationship?

You remained friends?

Yeah, till the day he died.

Larry helped Ali prepare for one of the greatest bouts of his career.

In 1974 Ali was scheduled to go to Zaire to face George Foreman in the

Rumble In The Jungle.

The undefeated Foreman was the current heavyweight champion,

having taken the title from

Joe Frazier with ease in less than two rounds.

George Foreman, at that point, wasn't selling grilling machines.

He was a scary, menacing figure.

And completely humourless.

And they were a lot of boxing critics who honestly thought that

Ali was in danger of his life.

If Ali was daunted by Foreman's fearsome reputation,

he certainly didn't show it.

He's a bully. He is slow.

He has no skill, no footwork, he's awkward.

And I have given him a name.

I named Floyd Patterson, "The Rabbit,"

I named Sonny Liston, "The Bear",

and he shall be known officially as, "The Mummy."

Ali's doing gags.

He looks incredibly relaxed.

He looks like someone who is going to the theatre,

not someone who is soon going to be going to a potential slaughter.

And why? Why The Mummy?

Because he fights...

When he's fighting, if you ever watch him in the ring,

he...he drags like that after his opponent.

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

And...and how is The Mummy going to catch me? When you fight The Mummy,

you just keep a step ahead of The Mummy. See?

-Keep it moving, yeah.

-Just move on The Mummy.

Nope, Mummy, I'm over here. No, Mummy, I'm over here.

No, you're moving too fast.

The Mummy don't move that fast!

Ali left America for Zaire in September '74.

It was the first time a major sporting event

had been held in Africa.

And the fight was a huge source of pride

for this former Belgian colony.

Travelling with Ali was his business manager Gene Kilroy

who had a ringside seat at the fight.

Gene, you are described as Muhammad Ali's business manager,

but that's quite a broad title.

-What does that involve?

-Well...

It wasn't about titles, you know.

Some said, "the facilitator", some said, "the business manager",

"best friend"... You know, whatever came up, I was his guy.

I looked out for him better than I did myself.

Around Ali there was an inner circle and an outer circle.

There was about four people inner circle,

all the rest were outer circles.

You know, they said this and that... We'd have dinner,

Ali would take a guy to dinner, join us for dinner.

Next thing I know, he's writing a book, he was Ali's best friend.

You know, it's... You see things, and it's unbelievable.

So, what about The Rumble In The Jungle?

We got off the aeroplane, everybody was... It was dark night.

Everybody's yelling, "Ali! Ali! Ali!"

And Ali turned to me and he said, "Who don't they like here?"

I said, "The Belgians."

"Ali," they are yelling, "Ali," and he goes,

"George Foreman's a Belgian!"

They started yelling, "Ali bomaye. Ali bomaye."

Ali said, "I asked my interpreter, what does that mean?"

"That means kill him."

"Kill George Foreman."

Ali bomaye!

Ali bomaye!

Then, when George got off the aeroplane

he had a dog with him, Diego,

-a German police dog.

-Yeah.

And I said, "Ali, we're home free."

MUSIC: Jungle Boogie by Kool & The Gang

# Jungle Boogie

# Jungle Boogie

# Get It On

# Jungle Boogie

# Jungle Boogie... #

It was an epic struggle in the boiling heat of Zaire.

Ali's strategy was to tire Foreman out.

With his rope-a-dope technique he leaned on the ropes continually

absorbing the hammer blows.

In the eighth round Ali floored an

exhausted Foreman and it was all over.

He was heavyweight champion for a second time.

You know the, what's now known as, the "rope-a-dope" method,

-which everyone had no idea...

-Well, he did it.

-Did you know?

-No.

He knew when he got in and started abusing him.

George wore himself out.

After the fight George complained about everything.

The ropes were too loose.

We tried to tighten the ropes

so Ali wouldn't fall out of the ring.

The mattress was too...sorry, the mat was too soft.

His corner was against him.

Great athletes never complain.

You never heard Ali complain about anyone.

That's the difference between a good athlete and a great athlete.

The Rumble In The Jungle became one of the most famous boxing matches of

all time.

Back in England, years later,

it struck a chord with a little girl by the name of Nicola Adams.

So, can you remember the first Ali fight that you watched?

The Rumble In The Jungle.

Oh, OK, the Foreman fight?

Yeah, yeah.

That was the big one for me.

All the press and the media, the interviews that I saw.

The big crowds, the crowds were huge.

I was like, "Wow, I want to be boxing one day

"in a crowd that size."

He was my hero and I always wanted to meet him,

and to say to him how much he'd inspired me

through my whole career and...

-Yeah.

-He was the reason why I wanted to become an Olympic champion.

So when you started boxing was the shadow of Ali standing over you?

Oh, yeah, definitely.

When I had my first competition at 13, in an old working men's club,

I remember going into the ring and thinking,

"I'm going to do the shuffle.

"I'm going to be just like Ali.

"Throwing my punches, moving around the ring."

I was so, so happy and excited.

MUSIC: Black Superman by Johnny Wakelin

# Muhammad Ali

# He floats like a butterfly and stings like a bee FRANK SINGS ALONG

# Muhammad

# The black superman

# Who calls to the other guy I'm A-a-a-li

# Catch me if you can

# Now all you fight fans you've got to agree

# There ain't no flies on Muhammad Ali

# He fills the arena wherever he goes... #

After The Rumble In The Jungle,

it didn't seem possible that Ali could get more famous,

but I think he did.

Ali was famous everywhere.

He transcended, like, the whole idea of fame.

He became Fame Plus.

Ali never seemed to tire of the limelight.

He appeared in comic books, films,

commercials and promotional opportunities by the dozen.

And there's one particularly strange episode from around this time

that I just love.

I've come to destroy you.

I've got to go back to the United States.

I'm the hero there, I can't get beat in Japan!

I've got some movies to make!

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

In June 1976, when he was Heavyweight Champion Of The World,

he agreed to fight a Japanese wrestler called Antonio Inoki.

In a, sort of, mixed boxing-wrestling fight.

So no-one really know what this fight was going be like.

You have serious problems!

AUDIENCE LAUGHS

Basically, what happened, Inoki just sat on his behind,

more or less the whole fight, kicking Ali in the legs,

with Ali shouting and screaming and taunting him,

and just trying to throw a punch.

They think that Ali landed five punches on Inoki.

Inoki landed a lot more kicks,

but it was given as a draw in the end, which was...

Inoki was furious about.

The whole thing was... It was insanity.

By 1977 Ali was still winning fights,

but he wasn't quite the fighter he used to be.

Guile and cunning rather than lightning speed

were now his best weapons.

His personal life was also making headlines.

His wife, Khalilah, divorced him.

Ali was then free to marry Veronica Porche

with whom he'd been having a very public affair.

The following year Ali shocked the

boxing world when he lost to

rank outsider Leon Spinks.

But then he beat him seven months

later to become heavyweight champion

for a record third time.

Soon afterwards he announced his retirement.

It would have been a fitting end to a spectacular career,

but Ali could never resist a challenge...

..and in 1980 he returned to the ring

to try and win back the heavyweight title

from the current champion...

..his former sparring partner -

Larry Holmes.

The WBC Heavyweight Champion Of The World,

Larry "The Eastern Assassin" Holmes.

14 rounds of boxing.

When in that fight did you know that he hadn't got the weapons any more?

I knew he didn't have it when he signed the contract.

I knew he didn't have it when he signed the contract.

When the bell went all Ali's aggression seemed to disappear.

He was dull, sluggish, and totally outclassed by Holmes,

but faced the onslaught with incredible courage.

'..Ali, Larry just continues to tee off.

-'The whole story of this fight.'

-Come on, champ.

'And Holmes throwing punches and Ali doing nothing. Just taking shots.'

'He is proving to all the fans that it's just not there.

'The body is weary.

'It just can't do what it used to do before.'

It got to about the ninth round, I remember,

it looked like you were really pummelling him.

I hit him with open hand.

I didn't hit him hard with the glove.

So you're hitting him with a slightly open fist

-so the impact is not as much?

-Right.

Ali would have kept going, you'd have had to kill Ali that night.

He would not have quit.

I went back in my corner, like,

"This is what I got to do, kill him? I got to kill the guy?

"Stop the fight cos you know he ain't got nothing."

And I knew that, you know, he was hurting around there,

because I was hitting him in the body.

And I stopped hitting him in the body. I stopped.

Ali, somehow, made it through ten rounds.

It was up to his trainer, Angelo Dundee,

to finally say enough was enough.

'That's it. They've stopped the fight - a TKO.'

So, when you went over to him at the end of the fight, Larry,

-what did you say?

-I was crying.

I said, "Man, I love you, man.

"I don't care what nobody says, I love you."

He said,

"If you love me,

"why you whoop me like that?"

Is that what he said?

-Yeah. I'll never forget it.

-Yeah.

The man was a great man.

I mean, I've fought a lot of guys, I had 75 fights, man.

Ali is...

..the best guy I ever fought.

It wasn't just about the boxing.

He was the best just when he opened his mouth.

-Because nobody ever did that.

-No.

Because they was afraid to do it.

He wasn't afraid to let people know he was black and he was proud.

But he said that in a nice way to make a joke,

and people accepted it when he said it.

Larry Holmes couldn't say that.

I don't believe that I could say it.

But Ali had charisma...

..and nobody could take it away.

It had been clear since before the Holmes fight

that Ali wasn't the boxer of old,

but now it was beginning to look like there was something very wrong.

I remember seeing Ali on breakfast television and...

..me and my dad both saying, "He doesn't seem right."

Well, Muhammad, I apologise for dragging you

out of bed after travelling all night long,

and getting no sleep, driving to Birmingham.

-I do appreciate it.

-Yes, Reg, I'll only do it for you.

I've been on the plane all night.

I got to my bed, laid down one hour

and here you come calling.

Ali, himself, kept saying, "Oh, man, I've got jet lag."

The fact is that Ali, even if he was dead on his feet,

would never have said that in an interview.

And I think the slurred speech,

he was aware of it.

And he was looking for a way of finding excuses for the way it was.

His friends and doctors were telling Ali to stop,

but at the age of 39 he decided to make a comeback.

What about the last fight in the Bahamas?

It should never have been.

He calls, said, "I've got this fight in the Bahamas."

I said, "Don't take it. You don't need it."

People were beating on him.

-And did you go?

-I went to the fight, as a spectator.

Stayed in his room all day and went to the fight with him that night.

Ali called his comeback attempt the Drama In The Bahama,

but it quickly became the Trauma In The Bahama,

thanks to promoters whose financial problems threatened to cancel the

entire fight card,

they also couldn't find the key to the Sports Centre's gate

which kept the crowd waiting for more than an hour.

And they forgot to get a bell. A cowbell was pressed into service.

It was terrible. They had a cowbell, nobody knew what they were doing.

After losing the fight,

and obviously diminished, Ali decided to finally quit.

Muhammad Ali says he will not fight again,

calling himself, "a beaten old man".

In 1984, after years of speculation about his health,

Ali revealed that he'd been diagnosed with Parkinson's Syndrome.

His symptoms, slurred speech, slowness of movement,

and tremor would worsen as the years went by.

But Ali confronted his illness with the same warrior mentality he'd

always shown in the ring.

During the '90s I was lucky enough to meet him.

By then he was deep into his Parkinson's,

but there was still a glimpse of the old sparkle.

I suppose, the thing about meeting Ali

was that he was ponderous and slow, and the face wasn't as expressive,

the speech was very, very slurred.

But it was like looking at this...

..this decaying palace

where all these incredible adventures had happened,

but there was still a light on inside,

and you knew that that special person was still in there.

When I heard about Ali's death,

it took me right back to my old kitchen and those fights I'd

listened to on the radio with my dad.

And I was sad, of course,

but along with the sadness I also remembered all the joy I'd felt over

the years watching and listening to Muhammad Ali.

You know, at the very end of

the last ever post-fight press conference that Muhammad Ali did

one of the journalists got up, and instead of asking a question...

..he just said...

"Thanks for giving us one hell of a ride."

And, erm...

..yeah, I should be sad here and mournful, but it's...

To have done that.

Just to make people, erm, just feel that...

..just that exhilaration of watching someone amazing at what they do.

That...

That's what I want to say.

I think I just want to say, "Thank you for that. It's amazing."

What a...what an end.

My goodness me!

One minute of the first round the winner...

via knockout

and still the Heavyweight Champion Of The World,

Muhammad Ali!