Fox Sports Net's documentary series I>BEYOND THE GLORY on Sunday, March 10 at 11:00 p.m. premieres its second season of the critically acclaimed show with a profile of boxer Evander Holyfield.
Many know Holyfield as the former heavyweight champion who lost a portion of his ear in a boxing ring when Mike Tyson bit him. But as this episode of BEYOND THE GLORY conveys, it was just one of many memorable nights in the life of one of the greatest pugilists to ever enter the squared circle.
While the documentary chronicles his significant moments inside the ring, the events that transpired outside of it are woven throughout and show what personal tragedies and exploits were affecting Evander Holyfield the person. He has a brother who was convicted of rape, another brother who was shot to death, lost his mother in a car accident in 1996 and is the father of nine children, five out of wedlock. He has been divorced twice.
People interviewed for this episode of BEYOND THE GLORY include: Evander Holyfield, boxing commentator Larry Merchant, his former trainer Lou Duva, his attorney and friend Jim Thomas, his childhood friend Charles Watson, his brother Bernard, his first wife Paulette, his father Isom Coley, his former amateur trainer Ted Morgan and his high school football coach Don Doran.
Born in Atmore, Alabama, a farming community near the Florida panhandle, Holyfield was the youngest of eight siblings. He was six when his mother Annie moved the family to Summerhill, a southeastern suburb of Atlanta, where she raised them all by herself. Evander never knew his father for his parents never wed.
This is the story that takes you BEYOND THE GLORY.
Here are some of the quotes from the one-hour show:
| Holyfield: | "If I had to do it again, I'd have nine, [children] but with one person." |
| "I want to be that husband, that a marriage lasts. So when I get married next time, it'll be forever, not just a stormy moment." | |
| (on what his mother told him about his father) "She never said anything bad about him, didn't say anything good. She didn't say anything at all." | |
| (on why he chose to be a boxer) "I never wanted nobody else to make a decision in my life whether they're going to give me an opportunity or not. So boxing was the sport that you can't blame nobody. You only get out of it what you put in." | |
| Bernard: | (on Evander's football prowess) "We just knew that he was going to be a professional football player." |
| Doran: | (on his decision not to start Evander in football) "He was a little smaller than a lot of our people. But, obviously as coaches, in hindsight we might have overlooked the size of his heart." |
| Duva: | (on Holyfield's current wishes to continue fighting) "Maybe it's his ego. Maybe he's listening to the wrong people. But if he's listening to his heart, he shouldn't be fighting." |
| Thomas: | "I would hate to see him hurt in the ring more than anything. It would be devastating. But, I would equally hate to see him spend the next 50 years wondering whether he could have done it if he hadn't stopped. That would hurt him more." |
Accomplished actor and voice-over artist D.B. Sweeney is the show's new narrator. Sweeney, who brought to life the voice of Aladar in the film Dinosaur, starred in such films as Eight Men Out, Memphis Belle and The Cutting Edge.
The second season for FSN's highest-rated weekly show features 20 original programs in 2002. The series, which also has been renewed for 21 additional originals for a third run in 2003, is now a Fox Sports Net in-house production under the direction of executive producers Frank Sinton and Steven Michaels.
Future original episodes of BEYOND THE GLORY include: Reggie White (March 17), Alonzo Mourning (March 24), Vince Carter (March 31), Gary Sheffield (April 7), Kobe Bryant (April 14), Dale Jarrett (April 21) and Lennox Lewis (April 28).
Fox Sports Net Bay Area reaches more than 3.5 million households in Northern California and Northern Nevada. Fox Sports Net Bay Area is owned and operated by Rainbow Sports Networks, a division of Cablevision's Rainbow Media Holdings, Inc.
Fox Sports Net reaches more than 78 million households nationwide and is a service of National Sports Partners, equally owned by Cablevision's Rainbow Media Holdings, Inc. and Fox. Rainbow Sports Networks incorporates Rainbow's 50% ownership of Fox Sports Net and Fox Sports National Advertising, and the ownership and management of Fox Sports Net regional networks in five of the nation's largest markets: Chicago, Florida, Ohio, New England, and San Francisco.