The Legend Of Muhammad Ali

I think most everyone has a Muhammad Ali story, and I’m no different. There are tons of them floating around out there — floating like butterflies — and they all have that Ali charm. Like how he came out of a Manhattan building and accidentally knocked over a little girl, then picked her up and talked to her until she stopped crying even though he was already running late, or how he attended a college graduation to pick up an award and then hung around afterward to talk to the graduates and find out about their lives, just because he so badly wanted to know about other people.

I’ll get to my moment with Ali, but I think there are some important points to make about who he was before I get there.

At the end of the 20th century, there was a flood of lists made by all number of people and organizations. The most important this of the century, the best that, the biggest of the entire millennium, and so on. There were at least a few lists about who the greatest athletes were, and Ali was at the top of all of them. A boxer ahead of ballplayers and track stars and soccer players and quarterbacks and point guards, but that wasn’t just because of his prowess in the ring, it was because of his prowess at life.

He was a reality TV star before there was such a thing. His television appearances were appointment worthy, and his ongoing relationship and sparring sessions with Howard Cosell will keep you glued to YouTube for hours and give you a new appreciation for the word “truculent” (Google it).

A certain kind of fame allows you to live in a sort of rarified air. It’s increasingly unusual, achieving a level of notoriety and heroism that even the most famous in other pursuits look to you in awe. Doubt it? Watch this clip from the 1977 Oscars and check out the reactions when he appears. First Sylvester Stallone, then the audience, reveal an almost childlike joy at his arrival, as a kid might if Batman showed up at his seventh birthday party.

He made people socially aware, made them sit up and take notice, take responsibility for their actions and understand that there was a whole world out there that we all needed to understand. A world to which we all needed to pay more attention.

He was a symbol of so much that was good and right in the world, while also recognizing so much that was wrong. When he was afflicted with Parkinson’s Disease, he became a very public face and advocate, never hiding or shying away from what was happening to him. The shaking hands, the unsteadiness, all of it on display in a time before the disease was truly understood.

In a sense, he was the real super hero we always wanted, but didn’t really understand we had until it was too late.

And it’s not like he wasn’t flawed. He was. He was vain, he was shortsighted and could be bigoted and narrow minded, but he ultimately would try to do right, with a deep and abiding integrity that was beyond reproach. He stood up to what he thought was an unnecessary and criminal war and spent three and a half of his best years behind bars for not fighting in it. Could you ever imagine an athlete of today doing such a thing?

Much has come out over the last few days, since it broke that Ali had died. News stories recounting his triumphs, commentary pieces about his influence, think pieces about where he went wrong and some of the mistakes he made, all of them fair and relevant. I’ve read a lot of them, and they all focus on some aspect of Ali’s charms or foibles, or his religion, or the symbiotic relationship he had with Cosell, or the tempestuous one he had with Malcolm X, and they all make interesting reading, but I think they miss a broader and inescapable point about him.

No one, not anyone before or since, ever transcended so much at once as did the man born Cassius Clay. He was bigger than sports, bigger than entertainment, race, politics, you name it. He was simply The Greatest, with a wit and charm that few possessed, to go along with the physical gifts that no one else did. He was uniquely qualified to excel at so many aspects of life, in a way I can’t believe we will ever see again.

That’s what we have lost. It might not feel sudden, because his illness and infirmity had increasingly kept him out of the public eye in recent years, but now that he is actually gone, there’s a void that probably won’t ever be filled.

Okay, my Ali story: The premiere of When We Were Kings, fall of 1996. Movie at the Ziegfeld, after party at Planet Hollywood in Times Square (both long gone now), which I was covering for Us Magazine. George Foreman was there, Joe Frazier, a bunch of others. Ali was not doing great even then, but when he entered the after party, entourage in tow, it was like a switch was flipped. Suddenly, the whole place was buzzing with electricity. I approached his wife Lonnie to request a few words with him, and after she gave me a brief interview, brought me over. I shook his hand. I’m 5’10”, and he was 6’3”, which is not a big difference, but the way it seemed, he might as well have been 10 feet tall. Twelve feet. Twenty.

Even shaky and ill, he gave off an aura of power and charisma I’d never experienced before, and never since. I said, “Champ, this is an honor. You’re the greatest.” He smiled and said/mumbled, “Never knocked me out a red head.” Then he cuffed me on the chin.

I didn’t hesitate. Instinct took over and I just dropped to the floor, taking the KO. Everyone laughed and after I got to my feet, he patted my shoulder and Lonnie winked at me as they moved on into the party. I stood there, watching them go.

I was on my feet, but they were no longer touching the ground.

Rest in peace, Champ. You’ve earned it.

Neil Turitz is a filmmaker and journalist who has spent close to two decades in the independent film world and writing about Hollywood. Aside from being a screenwriter/director and Tracking Board columnist, he is also a senior editor at SSN Insider.