Based on Deadline‘s report David Oyelowo is set to play iconic boxer Sugar Ray Robinson in the biopic Sweet Thunder.
An award-winning author and journalist and a national reporter for the Washington Post, Wil Haygood, author of ‘Sweet Thunder: The Life And Times Of Sugar Ray Robinson', brings the champion's story, in the ring and out, powerfully to life against a vividly painted backdrop of the world he captivated. He also wrote a draft of the Sweet Thunder script.
This project was first announced almost exactly two years ago and it appears that the same team is still very much involved including Moneyball producer Racheal Horowitz and Game Change screenwriter Danny Strong.
No director is attached yet, but there is a rumor it might Lee Daniels be on the short list since Strong, Oyelowo and Haygood were brought together on Daniels' The Butler, which is based on an article that Haygood wrote and Strong adapted and Oyelowo is starring as the titular character's son.
Sweet Thunder chronicles Robinson's exploits with an emphasis on an intriguing aspect of the fighter's early career. Despite being the class of his field in the welterweight and later the middleweight class, Robinson spent too long watching inferior fighters get title matches, boxers that he'd whipped soundly in non-title fights. The reason: boxing was controlled by organized crime, and Robinson declined to get in bed with them, and refused to throw a fight. Robinson helped expose that seedy underbelly of the business.
Oyelowo, an actor in demand, will next be seen in Steven Spielberg's Lincoln, followed by Christopher McQuarrie's Jack Reacher and is currently in production on Cynthia Mort's Nina, a music biopic about pianist Nina Simone.
Here's a nice documentary about Ray Robinson who considered to be the greatest pound-for-pound of all time.
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqMAHlEL4qU[/youtube]
