Undisputed Truth: My Autobiography (70 page)

On the way home, I was inspired.

“Wow, this is almost like what I do when I go over to Europe or Asia,” I told Kiki. “People would ask me questions and I’d go for so long on that one question that the other people would get mad because they couldn’t get their questions in. It’s funny, I hate looking at myself but I love talking about myself. I think I can do this. But, baby, my show is gonna be a little gut-wrenching.”

Kiki was so excited. When she got home she immediately started writing down a few pages, the intro to the piece. The next day I read it and it was awesome. She wrote what I would have said if I had written it myself.

But it turned out to be a long arduous process, because Kiki would want to sit down and write and I would try to avoid her because it was painful talking about all the personal ups and downs of my life.

We used to get couples massages at the M Resort, and one day the masseuse gave us a card from this guy from New York named Adam Steck who was working out in Vegas. He told the attendant to tell us that he wanted to produce a one-man show with me. We called him and had him over to the house and he pitched us the idea. It was serendipity, because we had already started working on a one-man show. Adam had produced big hotel shows in town like
Thunder from Down Under
and a drag queen show called
Divas Las Vegas
. Adam brought in a director named Randy Johnson. Kiki wrote the whole script, with Randy cowriting. By early 2012 we had a show ready to go.

We had a one-week run from April thirteenth to the eighteenth at the MGM Grand. I had so much fun on stage. The burden wasn’t all on me. We had a jazz singer and a live rock band. They’d play the opening number and then I’d get introduced and the crowd went wild. I’d go into my monologue, but we had the piano player still there so I could play off him. The band played “Midnight at the Oasis” but we changed the lyrics to “Midnight at the Ho-asis,” and everyone danced around. I was a party boy on stage, a real black Wayne Newton up there. I was talking about sad things in my life but it was delivered with a devil-may-care attitude. It was Vegas, I had my band, and I was busting off.

The show got great reviews. We had a dream that maybe we could tour it around the country and just maybe we could even get to Broadway with it. The day after the show closed Kiki and I flew to the U.K. for one of my meet and greets. Then we went to Poland because I had an endorsement deal with an energy drink company. While we were in Poland, I got a call from Spike Lee. One of his people had seen the show and loved it. So Spike had called the producer Jimmy Nederlander, and he wanted to bring it to Broadway with Spike directing it. By June we were rehearsing, and in August we had a ten-day run on Broadway.

Spike’s version was a lot darker than the Vegas show. Spike wanted it to be gritty, a true one-man show, just me up there with some slides on a big screen behind me and some recorded musical segues. I actually preferred the Vegas version but people seemed to enjoy Spike’s direction as well. We took Spike’s show on the road, touring all over the country in 2013.

Getting on stage to bare my soul is a lot like going into the ring to box. I can’t wait to get on stage but I’m also frightened to death. I’m like a racehorse just ready to burst out of the starting gate. I get out on the stage and I’m in control but also out of control. I have to rein myself in so I don’t talk too fast. I wasn’t born to do this but I learned to love it. Like almost everything else in my life, Cus was a big influence on the one-man show. I inherited Cus’s ability to tell stories. I’m not nearly as good as he was but I have that ability because Cus would regale me with classic boxing stories that were epic in scope, legendary tales of adventure and betrayal.

I’ve always had the profoundest veneration for great accomplishments. Money never meant anything to me but stories of great accomplishments always inspired me to rise to the highest occasions. Entertaining people doesn’t come as easy for me as boxing did. I hate what acting makes me do but I love how it makes me feel. I would do almost anything to achieve the accomplishment of entertaining someone.

I approached doing my one-man show the same way Cus taught me to approach boxing. I don’t get involved emotionally with that person up on the stage. You have to be emotionless but you also have to do it with all the passion you possess. All my problems in life came when I was Mike Tyson and thought I deserved shit – a beautiful woman, a cool car, a mansion. That’s when I got in trouble. I was always too impressed with my emotions. And soon the emotions became delusions. So I’ve spent my whole life since I met Cus trying to transcend myself.

But it was impossible to maintain that façade when it came time in the show to talk about Exodus. I had spent more time alone with Exodus than with any of my other children. I really knew her well. She was a true free spirit. A day doesn’t go by when I don’t break down and cry about my angel. I wear an earpiece during the show and Kiki sits backstage and gives me verbal cues when I need them. When it would come time to talk about Exodus, a beautiful picture of her would come up on the giant screen. Kiki would always say, “Look back at the picture.” But I couldn’t do that and still be able to get through the show.

In early 2013, I made two guest appearances on highly rated TV shows. On February sixth they aired my appearance on
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
. I played Reggie Rhodes, a murderer on death row who gets a reprieve when he reluctantly testifies that the man he killed had sexually abused him when he was a child. I was so psyched for that role. For once I wasn’t playing myself. They had to spend an hour putting makeup on my face to erase my tattoo. It was such a privilege to work with such great actors on that set. But then, before the show aired, more controversy got stirred up.

A woman started an online petition to force NBC to cancel that showing or boot me off the episode because I was a convicted rapist. She got a lot of publicity for this and her petition was signed by more than six thousand protestors, including
NCIS
star Pauley Perrette. At my publicist’s advice I responded.

“I’m sorry that she has a difference of opinion, but she’s entitled to it … [but] this lady wasn’t there to know if I did or not. I don’t trip on that stuff, I’m not trying to get rich and famous, I’m just trying to feed my family. Why should they care? Since I am clean and sober five years, I haven’t broken any laws or did any crimes. I’m just trying to live my life.”

That was my Uncle Tom response. What I really felt was that I had been broke for ten years. I had a family to feed and support. I’m not going to get rich from doing special-guest appearances on TV shows. What do these people want, for me to die? How am I going to make a living? If I can’t work mainstream, do they want me to do porn?

Luckily, the creator of the show didn’t buckle down to pressure. Dick Wolf issued a statement.

“I invite you to watch Ed Asner, Andre Braugher and Mike Tyson guest star in The Monster’s Legacy episode of
Law and Order SVU
Wednesday, February 6th, at 9 o’clock on NBC. In my opinion one of our strongest episodes in the last five years as it focuses on what can happen when there is an emotionally charged rush to judgment.”

I was also gratified that my friends, the ladies on
The View
, defended my right to work.

My other appearance wasn’t at all controversial. I played myself on an episode of
How I Met Your Mother
. That experience was amazing. The show was run by these awesome ladies who created a totally family-type experience. All the writers, the producers, even the security guards and cleaning people had been working together for years. Women can put a touch on things that no men can. Working there was like being in a big puzzle and everybody had their piece and it went off flawlessly. I had a great time. Listen, I don’t know if I am a good actor, but I know I love to act, and I know just from the love of acting something good will come out of it.

The national tour of
Mike
Tyson – The Undisputed Truth
, my one-man show, began on February 13, 2013. By some weird coincidence, the opening night was in Indianapolis. I was really scared about going back to the place where I had been incarcerated for three years. I felt like I was in the house of hate. Driving from the airport to my hotel, checking in, I felt something heavy over my head, a distinct feeling of discomfort. The day before my show, I went out to the prison. It was something that I just had to do. Part of my A.A. contract is to make amends with people for my past bad behavior and when I was in that prison I was just an animal and a jerk.

I was shocked to find that Warden Slaven was still working there. When I was in, he was an assistant warden but now he had worked his way to the top. He’s been there for forty-four years. Slaven was always such a wonderful guy. He would come in the hole for hours and hang out and talk to me. When I saw him again, we just bonded. He explained to me that he couldn’t keep in contact with me because he still worked there but he was going to retire shortly and he was going to look me up. He didn’t look the same. He had white hair now. He was a bit slimmer. But his energy was still so awesome. He’s a real Christian; when he comes into a room you can palpably feel his spirituality.

When I left the prison, I just started to cry. I didn’t think I’d do that but I felt like a weight had lifted off me. I realized that I had no problems with the city, I had issues with the prison. It was like I had been purified after seeing Slaven. It was incredible, I didn’t think at this stage of my life I would feel that kind of feeling.

One thing I learned after completing my tour was that all I know how to do is entertain people. I don’t care if it’s ten thousand people or five, I love to perform. It’s not easy because I’m basically shy. Even when I was a kid, I had the urge to perform. But when I would try to talk, some big guy would kick me and say, “Shut the fuck up, nigga.” But Cus promoted the idea that I was there to entertain. “If you listen to me, every time you walk in the room, people won’t be able to take their eyes off you. You’ll suck all the air out of the room,” he’d tell me. I’d feel like a peacock.

I know that I’ll never again be able to turn on the Action News and hear, “Mike Tyson just signed a multimillion-dollar deal …” Those days are over. But I can continue to entertain people. I won’t make much money, but I can do what I love to do. And just by doing what you love to do, out of love, good things happen.

When I look back on my life, it’s hard to believe how big an entity I was at the height of my fame. I was different than the rest of the big stars because I was flamboyant too. And I was just an immature child, really in over my head. I felt like I was part of a freak show for most of my career as a boxer. Later, I just felt like a freak. I’m truly grateful I don’t have to live that way anymore. I’m reinventing myself, as they say. Now instead of filling up seventy-thousand-seat stadiums I’m doing more intimate venues. Maybe God is giving me what I can handle now.

All I wanted back then was to be glamorous and glorious. That’s why I fucked all my money away. I just wanted glory, glory, glory. Your whole objective is to win honor, but as time goes on in life, I realize that honor cannot be won, it can only be lost. Then I got that epiphany that everything I knew was a lie and that I had to start over. I had to be respectful to my wife. I couldn’t refer to women as bitches and guys as niggas anymore. I couldn’t have forty-five girlfriends and be married. How the hell did I ever do that? Maybe you can do that when you’re a low-key guy but I did that when I was champion of the world. Do you have any idea what that was like? I was constantly dealing with pregnancies, abortions, diseases. One gave me gonorrhea. Another one gave me mono. I was living in a big West Nile virus swamp.

When you’ve never had anything, you tend to want to accumulate a lot when you can. But as you get older, you realize that life is not about accumulation, life is about loss. The older you get, the more loss you experience. We lose our hair, we lose our teeth, we lose our loved ones. Hopefully we learn to be strong from those losses and we can pass on our wisdom to the people we care about.

I’ve caused many bad things to happen to people. I was so selfish when I was young. I was the first one to say, “Shoot that motherfucker, that nigga needs to die.” Then I’d see guys bleeding on the floor and I’d laugh about it. When I’m with my old friends from Brooklyn I’ll say, “Remember when we fucked up that guy who tried to kill us that day?”

My friends will say, “Fuck that shit, Mike, we out here now.”

Maybe they thought I was wired. They don’t like to talk about the things we did. My friend Dave Malone would always say, “Mike, by the grace of God we’re here.”

I’m so glad that I’m not that guy anymore. Now I’m totally compassionate. And this is no religious rap. I don’t believe in confessing your sins to get into heaven. I don’t believe in an afterlife. This world is it. And it makes sense to do good in this world for your own moral existence. Doing good feels better than doing bad. Believe me, I should know. I’ve gotten away with doing a lot of bad things. There’s no satisfaction in that, only in doing good.

I’ve really come to a place of forgiveness. I’m not mad at anybody like I used to be. Back then, I never understood what a waste of time that was. I don’t hate Bill Cayton or Jimmy Jacobs for what they did to me. We all had a lot of good times, they gave me my start and I should be very grateful to them. I’m more bitter about myself than anyone else.

I’ve had an extraordinary life – the good, the bad, the ugly, the not so ugly, the very ugly. I don’t even harbor ill will towards Don King. I hear he’s not doing very well healthwise. And I’m writing a book. Those guys thought I would be dead or be a loony-tune by now. They never in a million years thought that I could be telling the truth about them now. They thought their lies would die with them.

I still have a lot of work to do. I have to try to really love myself. Not on a superficial “I’m great” level but to really examine who I am. That’s going to take a whole bunch of struggle, a whole bunch of thinking, and a whole bunch of therapy. I can’t underestimate how much therapy has played a role in changing my life. I think of Marilyn and all my doctors and counselors in my various rehabs and I’m eternally grateful to them. Marilyn took me to a place that I could never have been able to go. I might not be totally there, but she took me to a place where I could live, I could survive, in my confusion. I’ve still got some mental and emotional issues but I’m learning to live in this world, be happy in this world, where before I could never have been happy with a hundred million dollars. I could give it away, but I couldn’t get shit done. I don’t even have one percent of that now and I’m getting shit done. Marilyn visualized me being a respectable man with my family, staying in the house. Before, you could never keep me in the house.