PROBING PROBERT: FILM EXAMINES TOUGH LIFE
Calgary documentarian Day brings his mom’s biography of NHL enforcer to screen
At some point, everyone who was interviewed in Geordie Day’s new documentary, Tough Guy: The Bob Probert Story, was asked the same sort of question.
What drove Bob Probert’s demons? Why did he have them? Why was he so self-destructive?
“It’s a hard answer to give and I understand why people were reluctant to answer when I asked them that,” Day says. “I think that there are multiple reasons and I think we try to explore those within the film. There have been a lot of theories that would come forward. I don’t know if I have one answer. Hopefully you can watch the movie and come up with your own theory.
“There’s usually not one answer,” he adds.
It’s true that the film, which will screen at the Plaza Theatre on Dec. 8 and begin airing on Super Channel beginning Dec. 14, does not really offer a definitive answer as to why one of the National Hockey League’s most fierce enforcers led a life filled with drugs, booze and womanizing. The early death of his father — just before Probert began his hockey career in Brantford in the Ontario Hockey League — was certainly traumatic, although Probert himself often dismissed this as the blame for his subsequent addiction problems. There’s the theory that many of the NHL’s tough-guy enforcers from the 1980s and 1990s were prone to abusing drugs and alcohol as a way of coping with their role in the game and what was expected of them. An even simpler theory is that Probert, like many gifted athletes, was simply driven to the extreme in all his activities, whether it be hockey, womanizing, drinking or taking drugs.
Whatever the case, Probert’s troubled life is at the heart of Day ’s documentary and the 28-yearold filmmaker doesn’t pull any punches in chronicling the former Detroit Red Wings and Chicago Blackhawks forward’s dizzying highs and crashing lows. Not surprisingly, the film starts with a fight, showing his famous 1992 confrontations with the New York Rangers’ Tie Domi. The fisticuffs come complete with commentary, both by Probert from pre-recorded audio interviews and by modernday Domi, who appears in the film and still seems amused by the rivalry.
It’s a powerful intro, with Probert shedding a bit of light on his tough-guy psychology and endurance: “I’ve heard announcers say I get stronger as the fight goes on,” he says, as we see footage of him wailing on Domi at Madison Square Gardens. “You want to win so badly, you overcome your tiredness.”
“We had all the right elements,” Day says. “The hockey fights are so dramatic. All the interviews we had with him are so great. (Wife Dani Probert) has a bunch of family home video footage that was awesome. All the pieces seemed to fit.”
Tough Guy may have all the visual elements of a great hockey film, but it actually began as a book. Probert co-wrote Tough Guy: My Life on the Edge with Kirstie McLellan Day, who has co-written a number of hockey memoirs and is also Geordie Day’s mother. Probert was working with the author on the book when he died of a heart attack while boating on Ontario’s Lake St. Clair in the summer of 2010. Dani Probert decided to continue work on the book, which was published later that year. Of all the hockey books co-authored by his mother — McLellan Day has also co-written books with Theo Fleury, Ron MacLean, Curtis Joseph and Wayne Gretzky — the Probert memoir was the one that Day related to most and thought would make the best film.
Day’s mother, who describes Probert as a “big lovable teddy bear,” had recorded hours of interviews with her subject before his tragic death, which is repurposed for the film. It adds extra intimacy and even some dark humour to the tale. We hear Probert’s matter-of-fact, witheringly honest commentary, usually sprinkled with a generous dose of f-bombs, about his alcoholism, drug-taking, on-ice fighting and troubles with teammates, coaches and rivals. He chronicles his harrowing car and motorcycle accidents and his infamous 1989 drug bust, when custom agents found 14.3 grams of cocaine after a 7 a.m. strip search on the U.S. side of the Detroit-Windsor tunnel.
Still, despite the dark personal story, at least part of what emerges in the film is a feel-good hockey tale about talent and perseverance.
“Even as a strictly sports story, it’s incredible,” Day says. “He lost his dad as a teenager and the next day after the funeral he goes and starts playing junior hockey in Brantford, Ont. He is dealing with this tragedy but will stop at nothing to make his way to the NHL. He literally fights his way in, like bare-knuckle boxing his way into the NHL and he becomes an allstar player. He had a 62-point season. So even that’s amazing.
“Then, obviously, the drugs and the drinking and the sheer scale of media attention that was the result of that. It was so huge. Getting caught at the border on a cocaine charge, being kicked out of the league. All these broadcasters and sports writers across the country were talking about it and saying he would never play again. He comes back and becomes an incredible player again.”
Day is no stranger to hockey stories, having co-directed with his brother Buddy the 2016 documentary Goalie: Life and Death in the Crease about troubled NHL player Clint Malarchuk. For that film, the Days often used dramatizations to tell Malarchuk’s harrowing tale of mental illness and addiction. For Tough Guy, Day wanted everything to come from the original sources, from fights to news reports on TV and the dozens of interviews with broadcasters and journalists, family members and Probert’s peers. The film involves input from Joe Kocur, Don Cherry, Jeremy Roenick, Sheldon Kennedy, Troy Crowder, Steve Yzerman, Tony Twist, Petr Klima and Marty McSorley, among others. More than 30 people were interviewed.
As with the book, Dani Probert proved to be an invaluable source. Perhaps the film’s most powerful moments come when she returns to Lake St. Clair, the scene of her husband’s death.
“I think, most importantly, it was just about getting Dani to go back so that she could go back mentally,” Day says, adding that he was in awe of her strength throughout the process. “The visuals are nice to show the audiences the geography and to help aid them getting into the story of what it would have looked like on the day. But the top priority there was Dani. The focus was Dani.”
The love story between Bob and Dani is also a big part of the film. Day says he hopes the story, with all its complexities, hits a universal chord with audiences, even those who aren’t particularly interested in hockey.
“We didn’t make a movie about hockey fighting,” he says. “That’s been done and it’s been done really well. We made a movie about a person whose story is really interesting, not just if you are a hockey or a Bob Probert fan. I think a lot of people can connect with the struggles he was facing and can appreciate the ride.”