Portrayed quite clearly in Will Smith’s successful movie King Richard, but the real father figure of sisters Venus and Serena Williams is not quite the same as what the movie depicts.
Released late last year, the movie King Richard brought Will Smith a Golden Globe Award and an Oscar for one of his best roles. However, the image of the father in reality – Richard Williams – is somewhat different from what King Richard portrays.
A clear difference is that Richard in real life went even further than his movie image to bring his children to glory.
The birth of two legends
In 1978, while watching TV and seeing Virginia Ruzici win the French Open and earn more than $20,000 in prize money, Richard turned to his wife, Oracene, and suggested that they both have more children and turn the children into athletes. tennis ball.
That may be the famous story that contributed to the birth of the two Williams sisters later. The truth is, at that time, Oracene already had three children from a previous marriage and did not want any more children.
But Richard was very determined, to the point of causing controversy. ” I took my wife on a date, and would hide her birth control pills, ” Richard said in an interview with Today. And that’s how sister Venus was born. The second time, Richard convinced a friend of Oracene to “steal” her wallet containing her medicine, and then we got the legendary female tennis player Serena, born just over a year after her sister.
In 1980, when Venus was born, Richard and Oracene were living in a spacious house just a block from the ocean in beautiful Long Beach, California.
Richard, who owned a private security company, decided to move the family to Compton, an area of Los Angeles known for crime and gangs, because he felt it would give his daughters his “warrior’s mentality”.
Sisters Venus and Serena Williams.
” Playing in front of thousands of white people would have been a lot easier if you two had learned to play in front of tons of gang members, ” he points out in his 2014 book Black And White: The Way I See It.
Oracene objects to moving, worried for his children’s safety, but Richard says he will go without his wife. In the end, Oracene complied. At that time, Venus was not yet 3 years old and Serena was not yet 2 years old.
Harsh upbringing
Richard wanted the girls to be “rough and tough and strong,” but even he began to wonder if he had made a mistake in moving to Compton, where the family was ” stuck in the middle of a fight.” everyday guns “.
Even though he soon realized he was living in “hell”, Richard still decided to stay and raise his two daughters to become famous. When Venus was 3 years old and Serena was 2 years old, he sent them to deliver phone books to make money. This caused many neighbors to criticize his harsh upbringing.
When Venus was 5, Richard – who learned how to play tennis just so he could teach his children – started letting her hold a racket. Their training grounds are abandoned areas, filled with traces of crime and broken glass.
But that made local gangs “irritated” and as a result, the father lost 10 teeth in the fight. However, he later said he still wore his dentures as a symbol of courage.
In the end, things changed 180 degrees. Former Compton council member Patricia Moore told CNN that the gang members were “wonderful” in the way they watched over the sisters, making sure no one was a distraction to practice.
Richard also had a rather extreme training method that made the gang members protest, which was to hire local students to scold the two sisters with terrible words while they were practicing.
He felt the training later benefited his daughters, as Serena won the final of the 2001 Indian Wells event, despite being booed by the crowd.
Richard also has some other “tricks”. Rick Macci, who coached Venus and Serena when they were younger, recalls how Richard used to keep his daughters from moving too far back while they were practicing.
” There were a few times when Richard put broken glass on the field ,” he told The Sun. To avoid stepping on the glass, the two sisters must avoid going back too far and be able to get the ball early.
According to a report in The New Yorker, Richard wouldn’t even allow his daughter to have a boyfriend, ” and to discourage any urge toward early motherhood, Richard would rip off the head of any doll.” that Venus brings home “.
The plan to make Venus and Serena tennis champions was a spectacular success, with the sisters winning a combined 30 Grand Slam singles titles. But the decision to move the family to Compton in the early 1980s had tragic consequences.
Oracene’s oldest daughter, Yetunde, also remained in Compton, working as a nurse and caring for her three children. While chatting with her boyfriend in the car one night in 2003, she was murdered by a gang member. The incident took place right across the court, where her half-sisters were learning to play tennis.
Serena said she cried when she saw the character Yetunde on screen in King Richard.
However, to many people, Richard is still an extremely tough father in protecting his children. Will Smith recalls a live interview with Venus at the age of 13-14 in which Richard shouted at a reporter. The expression on her face at that moment made Will emotional and said that was exactly how he wanted his daughter to look at him when he appeared.
“There would be no Venus and Serena without Richard”
No one really knows what Richard thought of the movie or Will Smith’s portrayal of him. After his messy breakup with his third wife, Lakeisha Graham, he suffered a series of strokes and lost his memory and ability to speak.
Serena when receiving her first Grand Slam title in 1999.
But for Serena, she is always grateful to her father who had a unique way of raising both sisters, and clearly understands why Will Smith chose his father to be the center of the film.
” My dad was a wonderful man — a wonderful man, I should say — and I think he was ahead of his time ,” she told Refinery29.
” There would be no Venus and Serena without Richard ” – the tennis legend concluded.
