Interview

New York filmmaker James Toback has always had a kind of manic energy that mirrors his hometown of Manhattan. Since bursting onto the independent film scene in 1974 with his autobiographical script, The Gambler, followed in 1978 by his directorial debut, Fingers (remade in 2005 by Jacques Audiard as De Battre Mon Coeur S'est Arrêté), he has made films, written screenplays, won and gambled away fortunes, and obsessively pounded the streets of Manhattan, using them as both his inspiration and his office. Toback's main obsessions-sex, drugs, and the odds-inform his movies. So it's no surprise that his latest film, Tyson, a documentary on embattled former heavyweight-champion boxer Mike Tyson, is about all of those things. It is also about a man Toback can readily identify with, a man both tormented and exhilarated by who he is. Tyson, which will be released later this year, premiered to great acclaim at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival's "Un Certain Regard" competition, where it was awarded the specially created "Knockout Prize."

At 63, Toback shows no signs of slowing down. His tremendous energy would put most 30-year-olds to shame (and often does so on the sets of his movies). I became friends with Toback when I produced his film Black and White in 1998. We recently sat down for lunch at the Soho House in New York City. For four and a half hours.

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HOOMAN MAJD: Jim, I'm going to record this.

JAMES TOBACK: [to waiter] What's on the seafood platter? [phone rings] Excuse me, hello? Oh, hold on, I'll be right with you. [to Majd] This is Tyson's manager. [to waiter] I'll have the shrimp, and a cheeseburger black and blue. What kind of cheese can you put on that? [back to phone] Hi. I'm doing an interview with Interview magazine right now. [hangs up] That was . . . Tyson has two managers, both of whom are very nice and good for him. Honestly, it's a breath of fresh air after what he's had since Cus D'Amato. [phone rings] Oh, it's the lawyer. [to phone] Hi, Mark. I'm here with my friend Hooman doing an interview for Interview magazine, of which this conversation will be a part. Yes, just one second. [Toback leaves the table to carry on his conversation with Tyson's lawyer. Returns to lunch being served.]

HM: Jim, what was the genesis of Tyson?

JT: Well, starting with when we did Black and White, it became clear to me that Tyson, whom I had known at that point for about 13 years-he had just come out of prison [following his 1992 conviction for the rape of former Miss Black Rhode Island, Desiree Washington] and was ripe to open up in interesting ways-was a terrifically cinematic figure. And he had this powerful effect on young, black, American males, whom I'd historically had an interest in. Many friends from the days when I was maybe six or seven were black, and, of course, in the Jim Brown era, I was immersed in the culture. [After graduating from Harvard in 1966, Toback wrote an "autobiographical memoir" of his time with football star Jim Brown.] The fascination that people had with Tyson only increased my sense of what might be interesting cinematically. And then Tyson was so good in Black and White-he improvised so well