Life and times of ‘The Featherweight’, Willie Pep

By Steve Hunt

FIRST-time feature film director, Robert Kolodny, woke up every morning for two months in a cold sweat. He’d been told that his movie, The Featherweight, a Willie Pep biopic, would be screened at the 80th Venice Film Festival. The news had not yet been made public, so Robert would wake up in fear that it was all a dream.

Then it was announced to the world, and it suddenly became reality.

“That was incredible. When you finish editing a film, there’s this period of time that is really nebulous where you’re trying to figure out, will it ever be seen? And if so, where? Never in my wildest dreams, did I think that it would premiere at something like the Venice Film Festival, the oldest and possibly most prestigious film festival in the world,” said Kolodny.

But then they announced it and was like, ‘Okay, it’s real’. It premiered there in a 1,200-seat theatre and totally sold out. We walked in. They were playing ‘Heroin’ by Lou Reed. We watched the movie and people seemed to like it. There was a six-minute standing ovation. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel very surreal. I’m just incredibly grateful. I’m very privileged that I’ve been allowed to be in this position.”

The positive reception from the Venice audience has since been replicated at other festival screenings, so the signs were promising that the movie would deliver. Many of the really good boxing movies are not truly about boxing. So, what does Robert feel that The Featherweight is really about?

“I would say that this film is a family drama. Above all else, it is a story of a man grappling with his place in the world. A man desperately trying not to feel irrelevant, especially at a time, the 1960s, when so much is changing, and the idea of masculinity is changing. Boxing is certainly important to the story, and frames who he is in the world, because of course, Willie Pep is one of the great boxers of all time. 

“But much like Visconti’s film, Rocco and his brothers, or Fat City, or even Raging Bull, boxing is merely the occupation that these complex characters inhabit.”

In making a film about the life of legendary featherweight world champion, Willie Pep, a major challenge that could make or break the movie would be casting the lead. Finding an actor with the right look, as well as the right hook, could seem like mission impossible. Step forward, James Madio. 

“There’s no better actor alive who could have played Willie Pep. I think this will be the defining role of James’s career, or at least the breakout role up to this point in his career. I will be forever grateful and privileged that he starred in this film and gave it 110 per cent. I would be remiss not to say that the idea of making this film really began with James. He was a child actor in Steven Spielberg’s Hook, among other films when he was young. 

“One day, his father called him. His Dad is an Italian American guy from the Bronx. And his father called him and said, ‘Have you ever heard of Willie Pep?’ And started to tell him the story about this great fighter in the history of the sport. He’s also a small-framed guy like James is, and James’s father was like, ‘You should play Willie Pep one day’, and this idea kind of stuck in Madio’s head. He printed out a picture of Willie Pep, and he tacked it up on his wall. He then carried this torch of one day playing Willie Pep. So, in many ways the inception of the entire project began with him.

“The script of the movie called for the film to be shot in a documentary style. The film gives a snapshot of Pep’s life in 1964, with the idea that he has invited a documentary film crew to follow him around. Pep is struggling with financial problems, domestic strife and coming to terms with retirement from boxing. As the problems mount, he contemplates a return to the ring. The combination of the theme of boxing, along with the documentary style, made this an ideal project for Robert. 

“I come from a documentary background. I’ve spent the past 10 years working on non-fiction films. That experience kind of culminated with me, deciding to direct a documentary which was going to be the story of Serafim Todorov, the last man to beat Floyd Mayweather, at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic games.

“I had been working on that for three or four years. He lives in Bulgaria, and so I was going to Bulgaria and hanging out in boxing gyms and talking to prize fighters, trainers and managers, and starting to understand the textures of these spaces that they hang out in, and sort of the sorrowful nature that is pervasive to this sort of character. It’s very cinematic and very alluring, and makes you feel really sympathetic towards them.

“When the script that Steve Loff had written for the film came across my desk, I read it and thought, this is perfect for me. I want to be making kind of epic fiction, narrative films. I want to transition from documentary into that world, and what better way to do it than working within this same genre that I feel like I have real world experience in. And the script, as Steve gave it to me, had this conceit to it, looking through the lens of a documentary. Steve and I continued to rework the script, and I injected more and more of this kind of verité observational feeling into it.”

Robert explained that there were several reasons for taking the approach of just focussing in on a brief period of Pep’s life. Many boxing films tell an almost cradle-to-grave story and the direction taken by The Featherweight would separate this film from those others. Next, there would, of course, be budgetary constraints. Focussing in on just a couple of years, rather than several decades, would help to stay in control of the very limited finances. However, most importantly, Robert felt that there were strong narrative reasons for the decision.

“I think it also allows us to intimately know the character in a way that we wouldn’t, if we were spanning so much time and covering so much ground. Also, by not seeing too much of his past and his glory days, we’re able to sort of seep into this pervasive feeling of what was. It feels like this othered thing, this kind of nostalgic look back that he has, and it’s kept from the audience largely, and that that makes it feel more valuable. There’s more lust attached to the want for the spotlight and the cheer of the crowd, that feeling of addiction.”

Certain boxing films in the past, that have told the stories of real-life former champions, Cinderella Man and Ali come to mind, have drawn criticism from some quarters for inaccurate portrayals of some of the characters involved; accusations of bending the truth to suit a Hollywood narrative. Robert was determined that would not be the case here. 

“It was very important for us and especially since we filmed it in Hartford, Willie’s hometown. We knew that we would be around a lot of people that knew him.

“And so, from the jump, we were doing our best to fact check things, do our due diligence. I’ll say that Steve Loff our screenwriter, is probably the foremost expert on Willie Pep in the world at this point.

“We tried to involve his family as much as possible. His nephews advised on the script. His ex-wife advised on the script and visited the set many times. His son, Billy, who was still alive while we were making the film, and who’s played by Keir Gilchrist in the film, came to the set. He met with Keir. We really tried to bring in the community and the people that he knew, both to be respectful and to pay homage to this incredible iconic athlete, but also to better communicate who he really was and be honest and genuine about the character. For the actors, this was incredibly helpful. For James Madio specifically, having these first-person perspectives really informed a lot of his character and how he handled the interpersonal relationships in the film.”

Naturally, Pep is not the only real-life character portrayed in the movie. Rocky Marciano makes a couple of brief appearances. But it would be hard to tell the story of Willie Pep without the man who he will be forever linked with in boxing history, Sandy Saddler.

Pep’s great rival is played by Lawrence Gilliard, Jr., who, as Robert explains, did a deep dive on figuring out who Sandy was, his motivations, and the effects on his neurological state that resulted from the car accident he was in. The movie shows the relationship between two retired fighters and former rivals.

“Part of me could just watch a movie that was Willie and Sandy the entire time. They had such an odd couple relationship as their lives progressed. On the internet there’s all these incredible appearance-based videos that you could find of Sandy and Willie in their later years, sitting at a banquet hall talking, and they’re just as you see in the movie. They’re constantly giving little jabs to each other, like verbal spars. It’s such an interesting, odd couple, relationship there.”

The extremely eagle-eyed viewer may even spot an appearance from the real Sandy Saddler, when we flashback to an early fight and the camera scans the crowd.

Any movie goer with a knowledge of the Pep story will know that the tale of this slice of his life is not going to end with him triumphantly reclaiming the title. The Featherweight still manages to conjure up a powerful conclusion.

“I would say, without spoiling anything, that for the entire film, we’re on the outside looking in at Willie and his experiences. And I really wanted the film to end on Willie’s terms. At that final moment, I think, we’re experiencing something that is grand. And it is singularly from the perspectives, wants, and dreams of a man who spent his life striving towards something in the ring.

“The original draft of the script that I read ended with Willie at the fight, and he leaves the locker room, and he walks off, and you hear the cheer of the crowd chanting, ‘Willie Pep! Willie Pep!’ Just a great ending.

“But as soon as I read it. I was like, well, you know, it should really end with a punch in the face. And we developed this ending, we kind of heaped on the lavish aestheticization and anachronistic sounds and music, and the grandiose nature of when you look back at something, and you have nostalgia for something that you love deeply. Its mythos and legend grows in your head.

“I wanted this ending to communicate that from Willie’s perspective how something looks from one angle is not necessarily how it looks from the other angle.”

There have been far more films about boxing than about any other sport. Baseball is quite a distant second. Our sport appears to have an enduring appeal that doesn’t seem to be diminishing to filmmakers or viewers. Why is that?

“I think boxing provides a very direct one-to-one to the base human conflict of not only man against man, but man against himself. These are intrinsic to the dramatic question, and to the scope of what drama and storytelling are. Even just the bare image of two individuals on the canvas, spotlit in the dark is deeply cinematic. It is a proxy for overcoming something. So, I think that is the language that exists. I think it is also important to mention that images of pugilists have existed in cinema since the beginning of cinema itself, since the late 1800s. Some of the first images ever committed to celluloid were that of boxers. So, it’s part of the lexicon in a very real way.”

It is clear, then, that Robert is a fan of the genre. Which movies does he count amongst his favourites?

“One that I think about often is Champion, the film where Kirk Douglas plays Midge Kelly. I love this one because it’s really, really dark and deeply an American story of hucksterism and bad morals. And it’s tough as nails, and Kirk Douglas is just incredible in it.

“I also love The Set-Up, which I think is great, great film that also talks about the dark machinations that surround the boxer, and the pressure put on by organized crime and trainers and managers. I love those movies.

“Fat City is huge for me. Stacey Keach in that film is incredible.

Rocco and his brothers, the Lucino Visconti film with Alain Delon, is an incredible boxing epic and shares some DNA with The Featherweight, in that it’s dealing with relationships.

“But there are so many incredible boxing films. Raging Bull is certainly one of my favourite films of all time. I almost can’t even talk about Raging Bull, because it looms so large. Scorsese is just so deeply important to me.

“But there’s so many good ones. It’s even worth mentioning the Charlie Chaplin film, City Lights. That was probably the first time I ever saw a boxer on screen. I think I rented that movie on VHS from the local video store when I was 6 or 7 years old, and you know, it’s mostly remembered for this beautiful scene at the end, where Charlie Chaplin’s clutching the flower and talking to the girl who’s no longer blind. But for me, when I was watching that movie, there’s this great boxing scene that’s 10 or 15 minutes long in the middle of the movie, and it’s very silly, but it’s also kind of steeped in real boxing. And I’ve since learned that Chaplin was a huge boxing fan himself. He did a couple of films where he portrays a boxer or a referee. 

“Boxing is just wonderful to watch on screen. It just really is. There is just something about the silhouette image of the boxer that feels innately cinematic.”