A second TV series about Mike Tyson is in the works. According to Deadline, Jamie Foxx will star and be an executive producer of Tyson, a limited series directed and executive produced by Antoine Fuqua and executive produced by legendary director Martin Scorsese as well as Tyson himself. The project was originally scheduled to be featured film back in 2014 with Foxx starring and Terence Winter writing the script. Now that it’s a limited series, Deadline says it will be “taken out to market shortly.”
“I have been looking to tell my story for quite some time,” Tyson said. “With the recent launch of Legends Only League and the excitement from fans following my return to the ring, now feels like the perfect moment. I look forward to collaborating with Martin, Antoine, Jamie, and the entire creative team to bring audiences a series that not only captures my professional and personal journey but also inspires and entertains.”
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In June 2020, Foxx confirmed the project was underway in production. “Doing biographies is a tough thing. “Sometimes it takes 20 years to get them done, but we officially got the real ball rolling,” Foxx said to Mark Birnbaum in an Instagram Live video. Foxx also talked about the time he met Tyson for the first time.
“So I started hanging out with Mike Tyson so I got to see Mike in two different ways, two different lives,” Foxx said. “I saw him at the height of his career and then when things got bad, things got bumpy, I also saw him as well, so what I’m excited about the movie is to show those moments of the different Mike.”
The news of the Foxx-Tyson limited series comes after Hulu announced a new biopic series about Tyson was going to be released soon. The series is called Iron Mike and it will “explore the wild, tragic and controversial life and career behind one of the most polarizing figures in sports culture – heavyweight champion Mike Tyson.”
In a statement on Iron Mike, Tyson said: “Hulu’s announcement to do an unauthorized mini-series of the Tyson story without compensation, although unfortunate, isn’t surprising. This announcement on the heels of social disparities in our country is a prime example of how Hulu’s corporate greed led to this tone-deaf cultural misappropriation of the Tyson life story.”
