Film flashback brings emotions flooding back to King
Even 44 years ago can seem like yesterday with one raw, big-screen flashback.
It was Sept. 20, 1973, moments after grinding out a 6-4, 6-3, 6-3, winner take-all $100,000 victory over Bobby Riggs in the uber-hyped live televised tennis match at the Houston Astrodome.
Billie Jean King, the reigning Wimbledon champion, went back to the empty locker room, sat alone on a bench and had a good cry.
The TV cameras didn’t see it. But in “Battle of the Sexes,” the new Fox Searchlight film that comes out Friday with a title mirroring the event’s headline, actress Emma Stone plays the role of King and recreates that emotional release in a revealing, climatic scene.
King fights back tears all over again when she sees it.
“It was so authentic with what was in my heart at the time,” the 73-yearold Tennis Hall of Famer said Sunday morning, the morning after she experienced that scene again during the film’s L.A. premiere.
“It was so touching. They captured it better than I could have ever imagined. It was 100 percent right.”
But she admits she can’t fully get her head around how she feels about seeing her life portrayed on the big screen.
She explains: Q>> There’s the famous line about how a movie will appeal to the mainstream — “Will it play in Peoria?” Considering the supportive LGBTQ community and the people who knew you growing up there, how do you think “Battle of the Sexes” will play in Long Beach?
A>> I hope everybody in Long Beach watches it . ... It’s so much a part of my life. I don’t think most of them know much of anything about my life. It’ll be something they learn. “The Battle of the Sexes” really did catch the essence of it. The conflicts going on. The emotions.
Q>> Like a final scene in the locker room ... it’s as if you couldn’t fully enjoy what just happened.
A>> The memories flood back into my heart and mind. I try to figure it all out. But it wasn’t just me. A great part about the movie is they put the original nine (players who defected with King to the WTA) in it. That’s the only thing I asked of (directors) Jonathan (Dayton) and Valerie (Faris). Because we did this together. I’m just the one who had to play the big match. Yes, I was the leader of the pack. There’s no question, but they made me the leader. People choose leaders. Leaders don’t choose followers.
Q>> Maybe that generation doesn’t know this story, how it started pushing things to the way they are now.
A>> That’s why I hope it will be relevant for them. To actually get a fire in their belly, to keep pushing the ball forward, equal pay for equal work, try to get the LBGTQ everything equal.
Q>> What would it be like if Riggs (he died in 1995 at age 77). was still around to revisit this match with you?
A>> Oh, I wish he was here, oh my God. He’d love the attention — he and John McEnroe, they really love attention, right? Even though he lost, I think he’d probably make the best out of it.