Jamie Foxx has packed on the muscle, but it's mentally where his biggest challenge lies as he prepares to become Mike Tyson ahead of the highly-anticipated biopic. Photo / Getty Images
Jamie Foxx has packed on the muscle, but it's mentally where his biggest challenge lies as he prepares to become Mike Tyson ahead of the highly-anticipated biopic.
The film looks set to focus as much on the battles Tyson has endured outside of the ring, as his rise to the top of boxing's mountain.
Most people know Tyson for his terrifying run in the heavyweight division when he claimed the belt as the youngest ever heavyweight champion at only 20.
But it was after a discussion with Tyson where Foxx pinpointed what the film needs to be focusing on.
"When we were talking about the movie, I said what's interesting about Mike is not the ring now, it's the Mike that we see now," Foxx said.
"When I called Mike one time, I said 'Mike, how you doing?'
"And it's this voice 'All praise to Allah, my brother I'm just happy'.
"I said 'why you happy?' and 'I'm happy I don't have money anymore, I don't have any money'.
"I said 'why do you say that? Why does that make you happy?'
"'Cause no one can take anything from me anymore, there's no vultures, nobody out there trying to take anything from me. So I'm just happy.'
"I said 'that's the person we've got to show'. He'll tell you 'I either live on top of the mountain or on the bottom of the ocean'. I said to Mike 'when I play you, I'm going to embody you so well that when I walk into your house your kids will run up and say dad's home."
Foxx was linked to the biopic as far back as 2014 but it's all systems go now and in a huge boon the 53-year-old actor revealed Martin Scorecese would be directing.
"Martin Scorsese who hasn't done a boxing film since Raging Bull has agreed to take on the helm," Foxx said on the All the Smoke podcast.
Tyson was on the top of the world during his boxing run, but has faced his fair share of controversies throughout his lifetime.
From battles with depression to drug and alcohol addiction to being jailed for six years for a rape conviction — the former champ has faced and overcome a lot over his journey.
"That's the person that we want to show," Foxx said in an Instagram Live series Catching Up with Mark Birnbaum.
"We want to show everybody evolves. Everybody comes from a good or bad place and I think when we lay the layers on Mike Tyson in this story, I think everybody from young and old will be able to understand this man's journey and the way we'll place it."
With Foxx leading the way the movie will dive into the battles Tyson undertook outside of the ring with one of the Hollywood star's close friends believing he's the perfect man for the role. Despite the heavy pressure his previous Oscar win playing blind singer Ray Charles brings.
"The downside is he's won an Oscar, he's played this epic character, so that sets the bar, you don't expect any less than that," Foxx's close friend Jack Manson said.
"But to get that requires study, requires patience, requires sometimes going into a dark hole to bring that out, and he'll have to do that."
"The biggest [reason] that took them so long was they wanted the right script," Manson added. "He needed someone to tell the story without just focusing on all the bad s*** that went on, humanise (Tyson).
"I believe that it won't all be new, but it's a chance for the mature, older Mike to look back at his life.
"Everything from the rape charges to being at the pinnacle of boxing and losing a child, he's had these peaks and valleys in life that a lot of us will never have experienced or even survived.
"He's got the time and experience to look back and reflect on it like, 'You know what, maybe I was a little bit crazy, maybe some of that stuff I deserved', but at the time, he was blaming everybody else."
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