For Rachel Morrison’s feature directorial debut, The Fire Inside, there was immense pressure to get the story of boxer Claressa Shields “right” and do it justice, but outweighed any self-inflicted anxiety was the excitement of moving from behind the camera to the director’s chair and seeing a project through to completion.
“It’s a dream come true to actually be able to do something from start to finish,” Morrison said. “As a cinematographer, I’m integral to the prep and production process, but then I hand it over. Now as a director, I’m involved with the music, post-production, editing and I have a vision from start to finish and I’m really excited to be able to bring it to life.”
As part of VarietySpeaking at the Toronto Film Festival Studio, sponsored by J.Crew and SharkNinja, Morrison joined The Fire Inside stars Ryan Destiny and Brian Tyree Henry to talk about how they brought the story of Shields, the first American woman to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing, to the screen.
“The Fire Inside” chronicles Shields’ life from growing up in Flint, Michigan to winning a gold medal on the Olympic stage. Destiny says she didn’t expect to get the role of Shields at first, and went into her audition with “an attitude of, ‘Let’s see what happens.'” But this laissez-faire mindset helped her land the lead role.
“I think it really helped me in the end and made me feel a little bit better,” Destiny says. “As the process went on, you just got more and more invested in the project, and then when you got the callback and you actually got the role, you were like, ‘Oh my God, I’m really doing this.'”
Coincidentally, Destiny and Shields are the same age and both hail from Michigan. The 29-year-old actress said it was a “weird experience” working with Shields, who plays the same character in real life, but that she felt “blessed” to have had the chance to bond with him before filming began.
“She asked me if I’d ever been in a fight, and that was one of the first questions she asked me, and I was like, ‘Absolutely not,'” Destiny said. “I think for a second she was scared, but then she was like, ‘Oh, okay. There it is.’ And after that, I was just so happy.” [when she saw] She really loved the movie.”
Henry was attracted to the project because he jumped at the chance to work with Destiny and Morrison, as well as his frustration that Shields’ story remained relatively unknown to the general public.
“A two-time gold medal winning Black female boxer from Flint, Michigan had never been on the cover or celebrated as one of the greatest champions of all time, so I started to get upset. And I really wanted to tell this story authentically and true to her, and I knew I could do that because Rachel was involved,” Henry said. “Then the second part was Ryan. As soon as I found out she was involved I was super excited.”
Watch the full conversation above.
