SLIFF 2017 Interview: Donald Rosenfeld – Producer of CRADLE OF CHAMPIONS

Producer Donald Rosenfeld took the time to answer questions about his film for We Are Movie Geeks 

Interview conducted byTom Stockman November 1st 2017

Tom Stockman: Let’s talk about CRADLE OF CHAMPIONS. How did you get involved in this project?

Donald Rosenfeld: A writer I’ve known for 20 years named Bartle Bull, who writes mainly about global finance for The Financial Times told me a long time ago that he wanted to make this movie about the Golden Gloves Boxing Tournament. The years went by and I asked him how it was going, and he said he was having trouble securing rights. The Golden Gloves is an amateur boxing tournament and they’ve never let a film crew in. He said that Mort Zuckerman runs the Golden Gloves. When he told me that , I happened to be looking at Mort through my apartment window: he was eating dinner in a building right across from me, and I could see him. I knew Mort via Nina Rosenwald, so she called him and told him that there was interest in making a film about the Golden Gloves. He knew my movies, as I had produced the Merchant-Ivory films and had just produced TREE OF LIFE. He said if we were going to do a movie at that level of beauty, he would be willing to talk about it. So he sent me to the Daily News Sports Foundation on Wall Street, and I met with Brian Adams, an ex-Golden Gloves boxer who runs the Golden Gloves, and his general counsel and his nephew, and we all talked about the potential film, and we secured the rights. So after 4 1/2 years of trying, we we were able to begin shooting! The first fight we filmed was in Harlem at the old Police gym, then we covered every fight for 6 months. We filmed at Barclay Center in Brooklyn for the Finals – The Championship. We picked six boxers to follow, from a pool of 700, we narrowed it down to the boxers that Brian Adams thought might win. And two of those six did win, while a third lost the final bout. It’s very dramatic: following the real story of these three emerging boxers. We cut away the other three, and it it’s their story: sort of the way that HOOP DREAMS was done. It’s shot cinéma vérité style. It’s a real narrative. There’s this woman, Nisa Rodriguez, who lives in the Spanish Harlem, born in the Bronx, who took up boxing because her husband had committed domestic violence against her. She escaped her abusive husband, and while raising her son alone, had three jobs, as well as trains all day for boxing.

TS: Unlike many documentaries, there is no voiceover narration in this film. Was that always the plan?

DR: Yes, I’ve made so many documentaries with narration. We did meet with great boxing writer and who I worked with on my New York: Center of the World film,  Pete Hamill. We also met with Gay Talese, because he has written with brilliance about boxing. But in the end, we just decided not to do the talking heads thing, and make it work without all that.

TS: How much footage did you guys shoot?

DR: Gosh, probably a million feet. The average feature film shoots probably 200,000 feet when you’re working from a script, but we shot 1 million.

TS: Was it hard to edit that down to 100 minutes?

DR: It wasn’t hard, we just needed to tell a story. When you’re making documentaries, there’s nothing really scripted. A filmmaker like Ken Burns may start out with a spine of a script, but generally you depart from it. You’re finding things. Your editing room becomes your screenwriting spot. So without all of that footage, it wouldn’t have been as good of a movie.

TS: When did you finish shooting CRADLE OF CHAMPIONS?

DR: We finished shooting two years ago and then we started editing. It was a good long 14 months of editing. JODOROWSKY’S DUNE took me two years to edit. With that one we had to figure the best way to keep the movie going. The best part was Jodorowsky himself, but we didn’t want to make a film of him just talking so we had to keep shooting.

TS: What about these three boxers; Titus Williams, James Wilkins, and Nisa Rodriguez? What have they done in the two years since you finished shooting them?

DR: Nisa has now won two more golden gloves.  Wilkins lost another, and Titus has gone on to be able to become a professional boxer. He’s won three championships so far and he’s about to fight a bigger fight tonite in NYC. Nisa continues to work at her day jobs and raise her son. Rihanna did two songs for the movie. She met Nisa, and fell in love with the whole project.

TS: What were some of the challenges that you found making this particular film?

DR: There were many. My lead cameraman was punched by a boxer. He got in too close and was knocked out.  That was day number one of shooting! We had all of our equipment stolen one night, when we were shooting in the Bronx. The real challenge though is that you want to tell a story about boxing that no one has told her before. We found a place that no one had shot before, the Golden Gloves. Many boxers, George Foreman, Ali, and many from way back had won, so we felt a real responsibility. I think it was challenging in the sense that we wanted to make it great. Our film won “Best Documentary” at the Big Sky Film Festival in Montana recently.

TS: Congratulations. That’s a prestigious film festival.

DR: Yes but I’m really thrilled about being part of this year St. Louis film festival.

TS: What’s your next project?

DR: I am shooting a movie near there soon. It’s a new version of Huckleberry Finn. It’s the first adult version. There have been 17 feature films made based on the book, but they’ve always been for children, G rated. Mine is going back to the novel itself, and I’m sure it will get an R rating. This will be a very dark tour of Hannibal. It will show the wretched father:  it will be a very adult movie.

TS: Will this all be shot on location?

DR: Yes, all on location in the St. Louis area. We’ll probably rebuild Hannibal in St. Charles; I went to Hannibal recently and it is changed too much. We’ll shoot where the Missouri River meets the Mississippi River. We may shoot in some smaller rivers as well. I saw a great section of the Meremac. I spent about six weeks this summer just looking around at the  rivers within 40 miles of St. Louis. A lot of them are on state park grounds and haven’t changed much,and would probably look pretty close to what 1840 looked like.

TS: Do you have a director lined up for this project?

DR: Yes, me! This will be my directorial debut. I’ve hired Billy Hopkins to find the cast. He’s a great casting director. We’re looking at Jims and we’re looking at Hucks. We’re probably going to go out into the world and find our Huck , he won’t be a Broadway or TV actor. I think it will be somebody unknown. Our Jim will likely come from the stage. Bill Murray is interested in playing one of the parts, as are Martin Mull and Ian McShane. Murray loves Huck Finn. I think we’ll have a star-studded group of characters. The father will be great.

TS: Good luck with the film and we’ll see you in St. Louis this weekend

DR: Thanks!