A pilgrimage to meet his boxing idols led a British filmmaker to Philadelphia

The documentary In the Company of Kings, which premiered on April 1 at the PFS East Theater, is about boxing and was filmed largely in Philadelphia, yet it never once mentions the “R” word (Rocky).

Instead, it focuses on a different set of Philly legends and hones in on a less-acknowledged fact. Most successful boxers are Black men who came from precarious personal circumstances, and many of them ended back in them, even after in-ring success that inspired people around the world, thanks to unfair contracts and unscrupulous managers.

“It is a culture,” Philly boxing legend Bernard Hopkins says in the film. “Boxing comes from a place where 99% of the time, it’s from urban distress, no income, fighting for a way to get out, don’t know how to get out, and eventually fight your way out.”

In the Company of Kings is made by British filmmakers, director Steve Read and producer/narrator Robert Douglas, who both grew up loving American boxing and boxers.

Douglas, who is biracial and suffered a racially motivated attack in his youth, grew up taking pride in the Black American boxers of the day. He moved from Liverpool to Philadelphia for three years when he was 24, which further entrenched his love for boxing.

“I feel at home in Philadelphia,” Douglas said after the premiere. “I came here in 1988, and I felt at home; I was accepted.” He also felt that acceptance continued with the audience at the premiere.

“And that’s how they are, they either say yes or no. They didn’t walk out; they came here, and I think they really enjoyed it.”

The documentary was filmed over two and a half years, during which Read and Douglas traveled around the United States to meet and interview many of the boxing greats they had long admired. They also went to Easton, Pa., the hometown of former heavyweight champion Larry Holmes (known as the “Easton Assassin”) and also to Fighter’s Heaven, the training camp long maintained by Muhammad Ali in Deer Lake, Pa., in Schuylkill County.

“The idea was we would go on a kind of boxing pilgrimage, meet his heroes and my heroes, that led [Douglas] through the school gates back when he was getting picked on for being mixed race,” Read said in an interview after the premiere. He didn’t want to focus on archival footage but rather the fighters’ human stories.

“It’s the home of boxing for me,” Read, the director, said of Philadelphia. “This is time for these heroes, these legends, they’re actual legends, they’re not [fictional.]” He noted, as many have done over the years, that the fictional Rocky got a statue in Philadelphia decades before real-life Philly-based heavyweight champ Joe Frazier.

In the film, Hopkins is shown visiting the Raymond Rosen housing project in North Philadelphia, where he grew up and, as he says, “learned to fight.” Holding court outside, he notes that the dog parks in Center City are better maintained than the grass where he’s standing. He greets old friends, advises kids, and shares memories about how he and his friends used to throw rocks at passing Amtrak trains. One man tells Hopkins that he was incarcerated when Hopkins fought and defeated Felix Trinidad in 2001, and “it was almost a race war in the penitentiary.”

“The Raymond Rosen projects, I will never forget. … Without that and those learning steps in my life, I wouldn’t have … the grit, I wouldn’t have, I believe, what it takes to never give up, and to look a person in the eye,” he said at the premiere.

“From Larry Holmes to myself to the Spinks brothers, to me, it was educational, but also it gave some history about the great city of Philadelphia and the fighters that were in it,” he said.. “ … So when you start reflecting on most of the things that you do, because you were actually part of them … it reminds you even more that you did great things with great kings.”

The formerly incarcerated (for strong-arm robbery, Hopkins says in the film) middleweight and light heavyweight champion had a long and prolific professional boxing career that began after he was released in 1988 and continued into his early 50s. Hopkins, who turns 60 in January, was known as “The Executioner” in his fighting days. Now, he works as a boxing promoter.

At the premiere, Hopkins was joined by former heavyweight champion Tim Witherspoon, who was born in South Philly.

“Philadelphia’s really special to me because I’m really glad that I was born here,” he said before adding his thoughts about today’s fight game.

“I think that all the good teachers are passed away, and they left [with] their knowledge with them,” Witherspoon said. “I came up with Slim Robinson, who taught me how to do a lot of stuff. And I was around Willie the Worm, Cyclone Hart, all those guys had defense. Nowadays, the boxers have no defense, all they’re doing is throwing punches.”

“In the Company of Kings” lands on all major VOD platforms on April 30.