King Richard Review

Venus and Serena Williams are some of the most famous and successful women to ever play tennis. The biopic King Richard looks at how their father helped drive their success.

Richard Williams (Will Smith) lives in Compton with his wife, Brandy (Aunjanue Ellis), three stepdaughters, and two daughters. He plans to make Venus (Saniyya Sidney) and Serena (Demi Singleton) into tennis champions, but he has to face the challenges of finding an elite coach who would coach the girls for free, the elitist nature of the sport, and the risk of gang violence in Compton.

Venus and Serena Williams don’t need much of an introduction. Both have won numerous Grand Slam titles and Serena is the most successful player the women’s game has ever seen. Their story was even more remarkable because of their background, and their father’s unconventional coaching methods. So, their story was ripe for a rags-to-riches tale.

King Richard went to great lengths to show the challenges the Williams family faced. The first scenes in the film showed Richard going from country club to country club trying to convince owners to let his daughters train there and he faced racism and classism. Richard states that in the opening narration that the Bayou was not tennis territory. Money was so tight for the Williamses that Richard had to scrounge tennis balls from the clubs he visited.

The Williamses’ hardships were shown with their living conditions. The family lived in a small house, the girls had to share a bedroom and had to sleep together in the same bed. The local tennis court the Williamses had to use was covered in leaves and junk and the area was gang-dominated. Richard Williams’ 16-year-old stepdaughter, Tunde (Mikayla LaShae Bartholomew) gets harassed by a gang member. Because of all these factors, Richard pressed his daughters and stepdaughters to excel in athletics and academics so they could escape from the ghetto.

The film goes to great effort to show Richard Williams being right throughout the film. He rocks the tennis establishment with his determined manner, going from club to club to get Venus and Serena a coach and badgered their first coach, Paul Cohen (Tony Goldwyn) into tutoring Venus. Richard also made the controversial move of taking the girls out of junior tournaments and rejecting some lucrative deals. The justification is the Williams sisters’ success, but just because it worked for them doesn’t mean that it would work for other players. The film also aims to show Richard being the one who instilled the Williams Sisters’ values of enjoying the sport and being humble, even in victory.

There were some moments when Richard’s character and methods were put into question. He frustrated the coaches, Venus, and his wife. There were questionable acts like nearly leaving the girls at a store to give them a lesson. Characters mention some of his indiscretions, i.e. his media comments, and ignoring his children from previous relationships. However, the filmmakers avoided showing the worst aspects of Richard’s character, and his actions were justified like he doesn’t want Venus and Serena to play in junior tournaments because he didn’t want them burnt out. He said that tennis parents should be shot which seemed a bit hypocritical considering he came up with a plan to make his daughters into tennis champions.

Will Smith took on the title role. Smith is similar to Tom Cruise: he’s a megastar, but he wants to win an Oscar. The role of Richard Williams allowed Smith to play to his strengths whilst still being able to challenge himself as a performer. Smith is known for having charm and charisma and as Richard Williams he had to talk his way to get his way. Smith mimicked Richard Williams’ way of speaking:  with a lisp and slight Southern accent. Even though he was amenable most of the time he was capable of having moments of anger and despite his claims, Richard was living through his children.

The whole cast was strong. Sidney and Singleton were promising young actors as the aspiring tennis players and Ellis was a compassionate wife whilst always able to speak her mind. The most surprising member of the cast was Jon Bernthal as Rick Macci. Bernthal looked different because he had to sport a moustache and lighter-coloured hair and he played a character who was dominated and tricked by Richard. Bernthal didn’t have his usual tough-guy persona.

King Richard was a film that had to show the challenges and hardships the Williamses faced whilst also being a sugar-coated portrayal of Richard Williams. The filmmakers managed to strike that balance and managed to make an inspiring sports drama.