Dempsey (1983)

Director:

Gus Trikonis

Writers:

Barbara Piatelli Dempsey (book), Jack Dempsey (book),

Stars:

Treat Williams, Sam Waterston, Sally Kellerman

Nominated for 2 Primetime Emmys.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Treat Williams	...	Jack Dempsey
Sam Waterston	...	Doc Kearns
Sally Kellerman	...	Maxine Cates
Victoria Tennant	...	Estelle Taylor
Peter Mark Richman	...	Tex Rickard
Jesse Vint	...	Bernie Dempsey
Robert Harper	...	Damon Runyon
John McLiam	...	Hyrum Dempsey
Bonnie Bartlett	...	Celia Dempsey
James Noble	...	Gavin McNab
John Lehne	...	Gene Normile
Cliff Emmich	...	Otto
Michael McManus	...	Babe Ruth
Mark L. Taylor	...	Price (as Mark Taylor)
Jimmy Nickerson	...	Gene Tunney

Storyline

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Plot Keywords:

boxing | irish american | based on book

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Genres:

Drama

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Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 September 1983 (USA)

Also Known As:

A világbajnok

Filming Locations:

Devonshire Downs, Devonshire Street, Northridge, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Charles Fries Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

100 min 112 min (video)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The African-American fighter named "Johnson" who injures Dempsey was in real life John Lester Johnson, who would later go on to do bit part acting roles, most notably "Bumbo" ("Uncle George") in the "Our Gang" short "The Kid from Borneo."

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Quotes

[After Dempsey loses a fight.]
Estelle Taylor: What happened?
Jack Dempsey: Honey, I forgot to duck.

User Reviews

Awful

Besides being a stereotypical watered down TV movie, this film has some down-right terrible performances. Sally Kellerman, who I really like, was just awful. I mean, unbearable. In fact, pretty much every actress in this movie was bad. It was baffling how the people behind the scenes could have watched the dailies on this film and okayed everything.

The script itself was poorly written but what do you expect from an early 80's TV movie? Williams and Waterson were okay in their parts but overall the movie was not good.

On the plus side, they did, however, do a good job with the fight scenes. Generally in these TV boxing movies, the fight scenes are so amateurish and poorly done (you usually can clearly see the punches are not connecting) it's surprising to see fight scenes done well in this film, considering how everything else wasn't done so well.