{"id":39149,"date":"2025-06-16T09:43:41","date_gmt":"2025-06-16T13:43:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/?p=39149"},"modified":"2025-09-23T16:53:17","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T20:53:17","slug":"requiem-for-a-heavyweight-1962-written-by-rod-serling-directed-by-ralph-nelson-starring-anthony-quinn-jackie-gleason-mickey-rooney-julie-harris-z-view","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/?p=39149","title":{"rendered":"“Requiem for a Heavyweight” (1962) written by Rod Serling, directed by Ralph Nelson, starring Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Mickey Rooney & Julie Harris \/ Z-View"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Requiem for a Heavyweight <\/strong><\/em>(1962)<\/p>\n

Director:\u00a0 Ralph Nelson<\/strong><\/p>\n

Screenplay: Rod Serling<\/strong>
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Stars: Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Mickey Rooney<\/strong>, Julie Harris, Stanley Adams, Madame Spivy, Val Avery, Herbie Faye, Jack Dempsey, Barney Ross, Rory “Haystacks”<\/em> Calhoun, Willie Pep <\/strong>and Muhammad Ali.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tagline: They beat him… they broke him… they betrayed him… but they could not crush the towering dignity of a real fighter!<\/em><\/p>\n

The Plot…<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Louis “Mountain” Rivera was good at one thing.\u00a0 Fighting.\u00a0 In his last bout, a young fighter put a beating on the 37 year old Rivera.\u00a0 Rivera was pummeled so badly that no doctor is going to clear him for future fights.\u00a0 Fighting is all Rivera knows.\u00a0 Now that is gone.<\/p>\n

For years Rivera’s fight winnings have supported Rivera, his manager Maish Rennick, and Army, his cutman.\u00a0 They have no savings.\u00a0 Even worse Maish is in debt to Ma Greeny.\u00a0 Ma deals harshly with those who don’t pay their debts.<\/p>\n

When Rivera meets a woman named Grace, he begins to have hope.\u00a0 Maish realizes that he’s about to lose his meal ticket.\u00a0 That means no money coming in.\u00a0 When Ma Greeny and her thugs show up, they will expect to be paid.\u00a0 As Rivera’s manager, Maish is supposed to protect Rivera.\u00a0 What he’s about to set up will break him.<\/p>\n

Thoughts (beware of spoilers)\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ralph Nelson<\/strong> was a 1963 Nominee Directors Guild of America Award<\/em> for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The National Board of Review<\/em> named Requiem for a Heavyweight<\/em> one of the top ten films of 1962.<\/p>\n

Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay) made his film debut as the young fighter who defeats Mountain Rivera at the start of the film.<\/p>\n

Jackie Gleason, best know for his comedic skills on The Honeymooners<\/em>, shows he’s just as adept as a dramatic actor.<\/p>\n

Requiem for a Heavyweight<\/em> first appeared as a television movie before becoming a feature film.\u00a0 The television production featured Jack Palance as Mountain Rivera, Ed Wynn as Maish and his son Keenan Wynn as Army.\u00a0 \u00a0Ralph Nelson directed both versions.<\/p>\n

Requiem for a Heavyweight<\/em> is another example of the Rod Serling’s stellar writing talent.<\/p>\n

Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) <\/strong><\/em>rates 5 of 5 stars<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962) Director:\u00a0 Ralph Nelson Screenplay: Rod Serling Stars: Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Mickey Rooney, Julie Harris,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":912,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,54,65,74],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39149","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-celebs","category-movies","category-trivia","category-z-view"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/912"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39149"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40071,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39149\/revisions\/40071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/craigzablo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}