Andy Lee meets Mickey Rourke | Fighting, De Niro feud, Finding his father, Hollywood, The Wrestler |

when i retired from boxing i was very surprised to get a message from mickey rook wishing me good luck and saying congratulations on a good career we've met up and become friends since and he's one of the most interesting and engaging men i've ever spoken to and i'm gonna go catch up with him now he wears the black trunks with red trim his professional record 34 victories with two defeats 24 wins by way of [Music] knockouts [Music] andy you can see me i can see it now you look real good mcgee rock thank you very much for joining us today um i know you've had a tough time as you said one of your dogs recently passed away and i know how much the dogs mean to you like [Music] this dog i had 21 years hmm tough i got to go pick up the dog's ashes today yeah your dogs mean a lot to you don't they they mean everything yeah yeah i mean you know you get to a point in your life where you can count all your friends on one hand and then my dog is on two hands mickey people will know you for movies obviously for acting a world famous actor but people might not know that you've had a long career and life in boxing also maybe as much as acting you've you've had a career in boxing well let's put it this way it's been long enough where i felt my i i failed my physical twice 20 years apart then the third one wait a minute and the third one i passed with flying colors how did how did you start making like what age and what made you get into boxing truthfully uh i grew up in a neighborhood there was a really good place where my mother and father were together and then my my mother left my father and she married this [ __ ] cop down in miami and we he lived he lived in a real rugged section of town and he had four boys and they were all really tough and i got my ass kicked by them for years and basically where i lived back where i grew up you settled everything with your fists and i remember i was very i was very quiet very timid and i didn't want to fight you know i didn't know how to fight and uh going to school every day you had to walk over this bridge and then there were the guys there'd be like three or four guys sitting on the bridge and they'd say your lunch money or a punch in the arm so i would give up my lunch money and then one day i was walking to school with this italian kid named jimmy rizzo i noticed when i walked to school with him these guys wouldn't even look at him and then i kind of told him about what happens to me every day yeah yeah so he said to me when after school i want you to come into my backyard because i'm going to show you how to fight and he's taught me how to hold my hands up and get a speed bag and uh and i i really liked it a lot and then uh i got into the amateur uh fights i i think i was fighting it like welterweight you had alright how much record i've read 27 and three very impressive well the three the three the three were disqualification [Laughter] do you remember why you got disqualified one yes i remember exactly one for hitting behind the head one for hitting low and one for pushing the referee i bet you disputed them all even the push but you know back then i was at the fifth street jim you know and angelo dundee was there and you know so you'd see ali there jimmy ellis every day i saw jimmy ellis and alice sparring jerry quarry oscar bonavena uh larry holmes came later on but it was the hottest it was the hottest gym you know on the planet and uh i picked up a lot of bad habits you know you could pick up a lot of bad habits watching our league fight you know yeah yeah except like keeping your hand way low you know you got to be real fast so it's like you know uh actually years later i realized as i'm strong i'm i'm much better suited to fight on the inside but it took me a long time to break the habit of you know freddie always wanted me to fight on the inside i just didn't have confidence in it freddie roach yeah yeah did you ever get any time with angelo don lee well i mean he called you know he's hey kid you know i talked to ali we'd be taking a shower together you know i mean he took showers together for like next to each other for you know about six years great and you never used to spy with a head gear well because i saw jerry quarry he was the only other white guy in the gym and i idolized it you know at the time they called him the great white hope he was a great fighter ah tom but him and his brother michael mike actually won a light heavy title jerry never fought the jerry never won a title i think any other area he might have been a champion it's just that he's any other error but he knocked any shavers out with one punch yet and he taught me how jerry taught me how to turn my toe and throw a really good left hook that was that was jerry's go-to punch you throw a jab a body punch and then a left hook um um over your career unboxing who is the best you i've read that you spawned some of the greatest fighters of all time but to you it experiencing it who was the best you ever aspired let's put it this way my favorite person to spar with was for a couple years with duran roberto duran yeah wow the only reason was because i'm naturally a 68 or 75 pounder he's a he's a little guy blown out he's a 135 guy blown up so height wise and physically you know i i was i was okay that would have been in the early 90s huh when would that have been around what what year i was in the early 90s yeah roberto used to come to all my fights and walk me out he'd be in the dressing room you know uh and then we'd go out to a cuban rest a cuban it was a restaurant they would turn into the nightclub and i'd be playing the congress and he'd be singing and drinking champagne the funny thing about roberto is we would say what time do you want to spar tomorrow and we'd say okay two o'clock all of a sudden it'd be two three four roberto would show up like four or four thirty and then my trader at the time said roberto goes by panama time time he gets out of bed but roberto i love swahili because i support a lot of really guys that hurt me but roberto taught like he would stop because no mickey mouse and he would show me like don't don't try to measure a guy because i used to like measure him and he'd go he would go no no i think why is he telling me no no and i was just measuring him to keep him away from me and then he took my my hand and he put my glove he put my glove on his shoulder and they put his hand over my hand and they hit my elbow yes yes and so i learned to stop measuring people yeah yeah yeah then james tony was the next guy for about two three years you didn't think you didn't pick some sort you didn't pick any easy gimmies anyway well freddie would pick but i never it you know i could say one thing in three years i never won one round with james stoney would he have been he wouldn't have been like duran he wouldn't definitely be he wouldn't hold back he would let his hands he'd like talk [ __ ] to me you know and i if you didn't say you break you know bring him you know he he'd eat you up so there'd be a lot of a lot of [ __ ] talk going on you know um but james was his technique uh he was taught by a guy named pops where he would you know he he was like the first one that would be able to do i think his name was bill strickland wasn't he they're from detroit those got those guys something like that yeah but he was an old dude he called everybody call him pops i think i met him early in my days in the cronk yeah yeah and he would he would teach james how to roll you know roll step over you know step over shoot a combination step back over here shoot another combination so you could never he was always in transition and set up to throw something at an angle where you were open i mean i think i think probably i watched a lot of monzon's fights and some other people but i would have to say james is probably definitely in the top three in his weight class of all time yeah hard to argue on his day when he was fit and trained and disciplined yeah but if you watch him kick he bear the hollyfield apart he took him apart rather easily by just boxing because james wasn't a james i mean he had he knocked you out with either hand but it's like he was more of a combination puncher than a one punch guy which brings me to which brings me to the biggest mistake i ever made in my life was sparring with tommy hearns what happened he dropped me in like the second round i think it was a left hook and he was fainting and he faked his shoulders and moved you know like i was like what the [ __ ] is coming at me you know and his jab was you know i rated i rate his jab and larry holmes jab is the best jabs of all time tommy's job was like a jackhammer it was just it was and i remember when i went down on one knee i went back to my trainer bill slayton and i said why'd you tell me to say thank you nate he said son i didn't say anything to you and then about this was like three o'clock in the afternoon then about midnight at home got very cautious and i felt like i was gonna throw up and i i got all hyper and i was trying to call the doctor and i couldn't push the buttons on the phone so my girlfriend had to do it what i had i never heard of it before i had a delayed concussion yeah from that punch and uh it's crazy when that happens i remember one time i was sparring a guy named karma cintron he was a welterweight but a big puncher he was puerto rican but he boxed out yeah yeah he walks out of pennsylvania and we were about to roll for a while we we were sparring it was about 2 p.m in the day we sparred good spot we did six rounds and about 6 p.m that night we're having a sauna together and all of a sudden i said come on how did the sparring go because the previous three or four hours since the sparring i just totally blacked out and couldn't remember or recall anything that had happened it just that's that's how hard he hit me was was kermit heavy-handed naturally very heavy-handed yeah he was a great baseball player uh is he still around is he still around or no one still around but not not fighting at the level he used to do he was like he was one of the best welderweights in the world at that stage yeah do you think like um preparing for fights helped you prepare for acting roles i did i didn't i studied so hard and i already had my technique down so it was very easy for me it's like you know you have a game plan i already i would i would read the script a couple times and make all my choices so i would have a plan a plan b but i always i was always i always took the acting very personal like whoever i'm working with yeah yeah like my mentality it's like no no it's me against you and i'm gonna take you to school that's why when de niro and i worked together uh it didn't go very good yeah i was one of my favorite films actually angel hearts yeah but he wanted me to bend down and kiss his ass and he met the wrong guy because i i read something about it um the director alan parker he said that it was like a sparring session when you two would share scenes you know what did you ever talk boxing with de niro considering raging ball raising raising my [ __ ] oh god no he's as you have i've read that you had like it seems that you have great respect for al pacino i love al al's great we're supposed to do a movie together as soon as this virus is over okay we're doing we're doing pinocchio oh really yeah i i wanted to work with him my whole life yeah yeah and we get along great you know yeah yeah i was interested um i read also that you've shook up a friendship after uh you read a lot oh look mickey since we've met and become friends you know yeah it's only enhanced my uh respect for you and my following of you but i read that about um bob dylan you have a friendship with bob dylan yeah you know i got to tell you something he's the most interesting man i ever met wow i remember he would knock on my door and i'd look out and he go it's okay and he says can i come in i said yeah bob come in and he'd have his guitar with him and he'd sit on the couch and i said can i get you a coffee you know coca-cola you say anything you we want you know and you can play the guitar and look over so then uh later on we were talking on the set another place but the whole time he was in there in my trailer he didn't say one word then we're on the set together one day and i i was very enamored of him and i wanted to i want to be friends with him you know i really looked up to him so i said bob uh do you go out do you want to why don't you want to hit the town you know friday saturday night he didn't he didn't look at me but he just said well i don't go out i said you don't go out he said i just had uh i just had a baby with the girl i'm with and i said oh i said is it a boy or girl tell you later he never told me but then but then a couple years later i got offered that movie the wrestler yeah so as i'm reading it i'm thinking you know what i'm going to do i'm going to call up bruce springsteen because we're buddies i'm going to ask bruce if he'll write a song for the movie so about seven days later i'm in miami driving down the street the phone rings and says mickey has it yeah it's bruce i said oh he i said he said i want you to listen to this so i said to the guy pull the car over you know pull the car over and he sang me the song on the phone and it was a beautiful song and he did it like seven days and the song got i think well it got nominated and [ __ ] but like so like i was very proud of the fact that bruce did me that honor you know and uh you never thought i called on dylan and asking him to write the song yeah so so wait so the movie's out and everything then i'm at i'm at a bob dylan concert after the wrestler movie came out and there's all these movie stars there buzzing around and i'm i'm just standing in the corner waiting for bob to get done talking to him because i don't like any of him anyway and uh bob comes over and he says you know he doesn't he doesn't go out did he ever mention boxing to you bob dylan no but they would they would we didn't talk about boxing he was because he was doing an acting role he was all he spent the whole time picking my brain about the acting but i knew he had a boxing gym yeah and he would he would always go there and i heard he would like get the back you know i heard a story do you ever meet a guy called johnny bars he was an old matchmaker um johnny bars he ended up in florida i'm not sure where he was originally from uh he told me that he matched a few fights with dylan back in the day he and dylan had a few fights under a different name in the midwest this guy johnny bars would bring opponents in from the midwest who had had good records but couldn't fight and he said he matched dylan on a couple of uh small like small towns small hall shows really yeah yeah it must have been real small yeah so i don't know how true it is what the legend the legend goes on yeah it's hard to picture that but you know yeah it's a nice thought yeah speaking of the wrestler how was it what was it like working with darren aronoski it was great working with have a lot of respect for him uh at the time i couldn't get arrested you know get him i couldn't get a job and nobody wanted me just he wanted me the producers didn't want me nobody wanted me and so he meets with me and he goes do you know why i'm meeting with you and i said well i heard there's a movie you're doing and he goes don't you ever disrespect me in front of the crew i've known all about you you give everybody a hard time don't you ever ever and his fingers come in like this and i'm going he's got some balls because normally i'd break that thing right off and the fact that he he gave my respect just the way and he goes i'm going to tell you something if you do everything i say everything you'll get nominated for this movie and i believed them and then he said i don't know if you're gonna win but you'll get nominated after about six days working i went to i went to i said to myself we're going to the show you know uh we won the bafta over in england we we won everything except the big award here like you know politics yeah yeah yeah that was a huge comeback the wrestler not a comeback but it was a huge you know yeah i came back for like for like two years and then they put me on the shelf again when they don't when they don't want you back you don't richard harris used to tell me he said mickey he said you can't beat these you know and you know how mad richard was you know because richard richard and i were really close it was funny because i'd go to london and we go out on the town having a drink he was only allowed to drink in the hotel that he was living at because all the other bars he was thrown out of but he used to give me great advice what was your fee like you know when you just to come back after the rest of those two years did it feel like retribution or do we was it all was it tainted for you after like previous years well people don't want you to come back you know my psychiatrist would so my psychiatrist would say to me mickey they especially don't want you back because with all their money and all their power they can't control you and they're afraid of that when money and power can't control somebody that makes them afraid my life is about my honor my dignity my self-respect it's never been about money i've never cared to be rich i don't even like the rich but and i did a good job throwing all mine away but uh the fame after the wrestler only lasted for like two years you know so i've been back in the [ __ ] since then you know you know early in the conversation you met you talked about you know growing up tough upbringing with four all the step brothers are all tough on you do you feel like you know doable two of them were all military boxing champions would you feel like that adversity growing up you know that hard upbringing would you have had the success you have you've had in life in boxing and in movies without it no yeah no it's like when i was doing the movie with de niro he kept crying about what i was doing to alan parker right there was a moment where he he bitched a little too much and then i remember i didn't lose my temper anything i looked at him right in the eyes and i looked right through them and i was thinking to myself listen you you ain't been where i've been you don't you haven't walked in my shoes there's no [ __ ] way you're gonna win this there's no [ __ ] way you'd have to kill me wake me up and kill me again so you know i'm when i do the acting i do make it personal yeah and it's like but that thing is very much like a fight if you're fighting a guy that's physically strong you know like a you know like a big left hooker you know that's got power over you you don't go out and try to match him with power you know you finesse him and let him shoot his load and then you start picking him apart as you would do at this time yeah and he's the same way you've got to you got to have a game plan if he goes this way it's like if you say you're going to kill somebody i've never heard like a lot of people gangsters and i've been around a few scream i'm gonna kill her they just stay quiet like you know we're just gonna take care of that you know quietly we're gonna take care of that you know you they don't have to scream and yell it and it's like acting you know it's like you make choices how you know if someone's supposed to be real angry i don't listen to what the writer says i make my own choice how i would handle it under similar situations yeah because i i also read uh i did a lot of reading as you can tell when you played the the villain in iron man they cut your scenes because you had you had you done what you had said you didn't play him as a one-dimensional bad guy villain they cut 80 of my performance out um but i heard also that you went that you went to a russian prison to prepare for that role you spent time in the russian prison is that true yeah just today okay and then i had a russian prisoner come to my hotel room i spent some time with and he had all these different tattoos all over like his body and he took his pants down and he had two eyeballs tattooed on his groin and then he explained to me the meaning of that and then there's all different kind of letters so there's religious tattoos there's mafia tattoos there's neighborhood tattoos and what did the eyeballs mean what did the eyeballs mean that he could see what's going on behind him ah but he said to me explain something to me the most powerful tattoo dangerous tattoo to have is a little tiny 18th of an inch face of a cat on your neck you said you got to be way up there like you got to be bad powerful and very crazy to have that tattoo yeah yeah you got to be man enough to wear it um um but that's just typical i i gave i did a kick-ass performance when they screened the movie we screened you know higher than anybody else but it wasn't supposed to because it wasn't supposed to be my movie you understand you were quite verbal and speaking out about that and you know most people probably would have kept the mouse shirt and played the game no i told you i told carrico whatever company it was the co-founder himself kissed my ass while i was doing a live tv show but i didn't i put a lot of work into it you know okay they won't hire me now listen there's always somebody out there that's going to take a chance to hire me because i'm good at what i do very good very good you know you know yeah okay i don't have ten zillion dollars in the bank but you know what if i did where i come from i'd spend it i'd spend it as fast as i got it because when i had several million dollars in the bank i spent it as fast as i could and had nothing to show for it you know and what's is is boxing finished for you now because we you know we recently met we met in 2018 and even then we were talking about another fight okay well i'll tell you something on the record okay i just came from justin's gym and i said to him that i had spoken to mikey garcia you know that is right yeah and mikey's a promoter and i asked mike he said mikey can you you put me on a card because it's tough to get a license in l.a so a couple of couple of the guys introduced me to the commissioner and two commissioners and both of them said no problem no problem you know uh so i got to take a physical so i'm supposed to i told justin today i'm like 200 pounds that is [ __ ] i said i gotta get down to 175. i said but let me take off at least 10 11 pounds in the next two weeks then i'll come up and start work in the midst and if i'm motivated i'll fight in november or december yeah if i'm not motivated i'm not good you know you know you can you know what's going to happen if you're not motivated yeah unless i could train 110 like i did my last fight i mean i was as calm and cool as a cucumber because man i know how much i busted my ass and i'm going that [ __ ] in the other room he didn't train like i tried i knew how i trained and i knew every day i would go okay one more sprint faster than yesterday one more round different than yesterday because my whole goal was how can i be better how can i be better today than i was yesterday i didn't want to none of this leaving in the judge's hands it was no no there was no way it was going to go the distance and you know along the way i started to feel real comfortable with the with the liver shot i mean i fell in love with it and years ago i was actually hit there you know and by it by like a guy two divisions lighter than me i remember i was at the fifth street gym in miami i remember rolling around on the ground [Music] you know you know what was that you know and i should have started using it then but it's like i mean i just i just fell in love with that punch if i could get motivated in the next 30 days i'll fight in november december if i'm not motivated in 30 days from today i'm done i always found that if you have the date something to work towards that's the that's half the battle with motivation but just training to train and not knowing when you're going to fight it's always harder it's always hard to to push yourself well the thing is it's like everything's pushed back with the movies right now because of the virus and you know but they're letting fighters fight with no audience so you know i'm not i don't want to sit on my ass you know turn into i don't know i was going to say somebody's name but i know now not to say it some talk you might be coming to ireland for a potential movie in the future yeah because there's a uh and there's a nun that i want to go see that uh it's a book about she wrote a book about miracles and she saw jesus like four or five times and she's she lives in ireland i never i would always say my prayers like sitting on the couch or you know just to myself but reading over half of the book i go into my bedroom and actually get on my knees and say my prayers and and i i go okay because she in her book she talks about how she prays three hours a day and i went in there and go i'm going to try to pray for a half hour and it's really hard you know i got to 25 minutes 20 minutes 15 minutes and i got to 35 minutes one day and i went wow but i want to go over there and i want to meet i i really want to meet her how important is your faith to you mickey what how important is is your faith i wouldn't be sitting here brother you know the things that i had come my way when i was in my 20s like the guys that i rolled with and the [ __ ] that i did if my grandmother didn't install religion with me i realized one day you can't be a real gangster unless you can pull the trigger and because of her upbringing my grandma with me i realized that i don't want to do that so even though i was around the gangster life and doing doing a bit of collecting and a bit of hijacking and a bit of this and that unless you can go all the way you can't you gotta leave the life because if you can't pull the trigger the other guy the other guy's gonna dust your ass yeah so it's like the religion really saved me from probably sitting in a cell listen all the guy a lot of guys i know you know they got they went out early they went out young they never saw 25 so you know like living that lifestyle as what you described it's it's quite it's quite a contrast to being an actor but how did that go how did you go from running the streets wherever you might have been was that in new york or miami at that time let me let me put it this way something happened one time in miami and there was gunfire involved okay now you're running down the street with a little tiny gun and there's guys behind you with much bigger guns wait a minute wait a minute this [ __ ] this is not for me you know it took that and i left down three days later yeah but it's a different it's a different world you know it's like the acting's a world i never really you know i don't have any active friends it's not a life it's not a world that i come from yeah yeah you know like how did how did you get how did you get into it like what was the what was this what was the spark if that's your that's like how you were about that what was your desire to to go down the road i was in miami and i had a big wound a cut on my leg that i i was going to the beach and kind of rinsing out hoping i didn't have to go to the hospital and i bumped into a kid that i went to high school with the year before and uh we were on the same football team and uh he said to me that he's been going to acting school for the last several years over in london and he was going to david hamming's acting school and he said to me he was directing plays at the university of miami and he said i'm doing this play right now he'd say you'd be great for the role and play this part and i said i don't know nothing about that he says oh no because this i'm working with this guy i fired because it's it's it's about two men it's about a white guy called green eyes and a black guy called snowball and they hate each other and they're the two baddest guys in the prison but in the morning they're gonna hang them both so it's about a conversation that two guys are having that normally would never speak and they realize that they have that they're very similar and so it was kind of was the words and everything kind of i went this is a lot easier than running and getting punched in the nose today let me try let me try this [ __ ] out i'll give it five years so i was up in new york i wasn't studying that hard i was kind of going through the motions i had half i had one leg in the street and one in the acting class and on the weekends i'd kind of make a weak attempt to go back you know go to the gym because i always i i never stopped going to the gym but i'd make like a week effort to think well maybe i'll do this again i was still in my early 20s director of on the waterfront aliexand he said that the greatest audition he ever saw was yours well he's the one he's probably the greatest director who ever lived i wish i wish i would have them now to direct me you know but my acting teacher told me how badly do you want to get into the school because in those days it was hard to get in they'd only take two or three people out of a couple thousand a year and the scene was between a father and a son and she said to me nikki how badly do you want to get into the school and i said more than anything you know plus it was competitive she said the only way you're going to get into the school is it is if you go find your father and i was 25 at the time and i left my father when i was six and i was very close with him loved loved him and uh like 20 something years passed and i got on a bus and went upstate new york where he lived and i found him and we had a four-hour conversation and then that next night i had to do a scene between the father and son and all it was in my whole body in my head my heart came out in the scene uh of seeing my my father because she said to me when you see him don't whatever emotion you're feeling don't let it out let it out tomorrow night the following night because it was it was it was a you know you don't see your dad for 20 years and then uh you go talk to him and you say are you selling so and he says yeah and i say i'm i'm mickey and uh and then i said could we go talk somewhere and we went across the street and we talked and uh did you reconcile huh did you reconcile with him it wasn't his fault i've never gotten over not being with him but when i got to go to that kind of place when i'm acting i just use bits and pieces like him him because i have such strong feelings about how i felt about him you know uh because he he died a year he he died a year after i met him he died at 47. he drank himself to death he actually was a bodybuilding champion really well i mean his real job was a carpenter or a one of those guys called they look over people's uh their workers on big houses caretaker caretaker caretaker yeah you know he never really had it like my grandmother told me he never liked to work he just like to lift weights look in the mirror and screw your mother's girlfriends well did he get he did he get this did he eventually get to see you be successful i know he died a year later but by that stage had you made it into he saw a couple of things yeah you saw a couple things oh wait yeah wait no no maybe one maybe one maybe one television thing i think and come out yeah something small on the telly yeah but uh it happened i happened to walk into a store and i went into the store there was a little sandwich shop that i remembered when i was little he and i would go to on the weekends and i just went into the shop because i remembered it and the strange thing anthony is he was in the shops wow wow yeah that's incredible that's incredible yeah yeah you know him straight away no because you know he was a drinker and when he was when he was young he was really handsome you know really great like had a phenomenal physique when all these bodybuilding contests and he didn't look like that anymore but i recognized him by his back he had like a really still had like a big back i recognized him from his back because he had his hair combed back it was nighttime but with the sunglasses on and a and a trench coat and motorcycle boots you know i thought that's a character uh but you know uh and i liked him i liked him it's funny because like it's something i've been thinking about a lot lately myself having having two children and being able to you know afford them the things in life that i never had yeah and how you spoke about how adversity made you who you are and that whatever adversely i had grown up definitely shaped me and drove me on to do anything i did in boxing and i just wonder you know how much are [Music] you uh by giving them everything they they they want or need how much you know you you're actually hurting them or selling them shorter or you know i i just want them i think there's a happy medium you know like the kid who got me into the acting his father gave him everything he even gave me a job you know uh he liked fighters so when i was an amateur fighter he used to hire some of the out of work fighters at the gym we were laying floors and so he would always give us work but his son he gave everything to now when he when them when the old man died the kid couldn't wipe his own ass and he fell apart and he think he died like two years ago when you see great fighters and their sons turn pro and try to fight they're never as good as the the fathers you look at any junior of a great fighter same thing with actors you know because they don't have the live experience i guess or the character that's built hey they don't have the life experience or the character that's built through adversity yeah yeah i know a lot and i know a lot of them too and i feel bad for them you know it's like i'm very close to steve mcqueen's son yeah steve mcqueen was the man i mean the young the young generation now don't know but there's not a [ __ ] actor now now who's a movie star that could touch steve mcqueen there's no nobody oh tom cruise give me a [ __ ] break nobody could touch steve mcqueen so how is his son gonna fill those shoes you know his son's a great kid you know would you want us would you want your son to fight i'll teach him how to box but he's gonna have to want it himself i think yeah you know it has to come from within doesn't it as soon as assuming someone punches you with the dove yeah he's only look he's he's looking like a southpaw i'm putting him on the plane and he's hitting the little toys nobody'll want to fight him yeah it's changed it's changed now i think i didn't get years ago no one wanted to fight southpaws southpaws couldn't get a fight no i hate spar i hate i just bumped into a kid that i spar with all the time it was a southpaw and it was like he said ah let's you know which is far you know venice mataroshi yeah oh [ __ ] can i check chase him all around the rig try finally what i realized to do is not chase him i'd stand still and let him come to me yeah yeah and his father said to me you're smart and i said now i realize this is what banners wants me to do because he's a very slick fighter uh so i realized you know and he had a longer reach he's really quick he's olympia four for the world tie he was a world cha title holder i think at light middle and then you [ __ ] a lovkin yes yeah probably a step too far move up and wait a short notice too yeah because he's he's he's a good six too but i think he fought it like only 154 or something he's a alive middleweight yeah yeah what did you fight 68 or seven or 16 middle school most of my career i had a few fights at light middle um but now i'm probably up at the cruiserweight division my house right now looks like a gym because all the gyms are closed yeah yeah so you're just walking out of the home mostly hold on i'll show you my i'll show you my house here watch this here can you see that yeah wait a minute who's that my brother oh yeah yeah yeah i recognize him from your from your posts can you read that um death long before he has run no shitty shitty bull yeah did you live in melrose mickey why do you live in melrose no i live uh hold on here here's my kitchen with the speed ball and the body bag and the wall bag do your eggs and do some uh speed there's the ram yeah duran yeah hold on oh here's my last weigh-in 175 yep 73 there wow where are you at some office this is the studio um yeah it's it's it's a it's a radio studio look i've worked here for three years why would i show you something i worked in three years and this has been on the shelf the whole time i only saw it today your movie the wrestler look at that look at that it's been here the whole time great film uh mickey thank you very much you know what happened wow i had to get myself up to my weight yeah yeah so i i was about 180 88 pounds i got up to 236 and then the movie was over and then a girl i was going out with got sick and i had to bring her to europe for treatments i put on another 11 pounds when i came back to the states i was 250 pounds it took me three years to get it off but you know i would never put weight on again like that for a movie yeah yeah hey look it was worth it it was a great performance on it you know and i would have failed every piss cup every piss test in town i would have failed oh mickey thank you so much for your time really appreciate it and uh thank you for your wisdom and and your insight and everything you

Channel: Off The Ball

Views: 136,685

Keywords: andy lee, mickey rourke, andy lee mickey rourke, rourke, boxing, training, comeback, de niro, robert de niro, deniro, the wrestler, de niro rourke feud, feud, de niro feud, rant, interview, iron man, iron man 2, mickey rourke 2020, mickey rourke 2020 interview, mickey rourke robert de niro, sin city, mickey rourke then and now, the irishman, jack nicklaus, instagram, netflix, 2020, acting tips, acting, actor, showbiz, entertainment, michael jordan, podcast, off the ball, #AllNewSEATLeon

Id: GQFCyY6dqUE

Length: 54min 0sec (3240 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 23 2020