Documentary chronicles Dundee and Ali in Miami
Posted on Wed, Aug. 06, 2008
By GREG COTE
The familiar voice of famed boxing trainer Angelo Dundee -- Muhammad Ali's guy -- came gravelly over the conference-call line Tuesday, talking about the day they demolished the old Fifth Street Gym in Miami Beach, where Ali, then Cassius Clay, learned his trade.
''I was broken-hearted,'' Dundee said. ``I went to that gym seven days a week. It was like home for me. Everything was a holiday there. It was like going to a picnic. It's where I got all the intelligence I picked up.''
The Fifth Street Gym, circa early 1960s, is a focal point of a new documentary, Muhammad Ali: Made in Miami, to be broadcast nationally for the first time Aug. 11, and coming out on DVD on Aug. 12.
Dundee and Miami's Ferdie Pacheco, ''The Fight Doctor,'' are among many figures from those days who recount the era when Clay became Ali, and became an American icon. Clay's stunning upset of Sonny Liston is explored, along with his friendship with Malcolm X and his residing in Overtown.
''We blended,'' Dundee said Tuesday about his relationship with Ali. 'I never made him feel like, `Do this, do that.' If I did, I wouldn't have been there two days!''
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