The Fire Inside

Following the thread of pleasure to all sorts of unexpected places.

Claressa Shields, backstage at the Olympic Trials, Spokane Washington, 2012

In 2011, in the throws of parenting and all the ways a woman can get lost in motherhood, I found my way to the boxing gym.

I met boxer Vanessa Chakour at human rights organization a few months earlier. She was training young women getting out of the sex trade to find their power and balance. She encouraged me to come to the gym and give it a try.

I woke before dawn three mornings a week and made my way to a sub, sub basement on Church Street where I learned how to jab, duck, roll and throw upper cuts and, my favorite, body shots.

A few months in I was ready to spar. The bell rang. We circled. I stepped in, jabbed, punched and fell short. I did this again and again until my sparring partner stopped and said, “hit me!” The phrase “Pulling your punches” suddenly made senses. How many times had I held back? Stepping into the ring is an agreement to hit and be hit as a way to test yourself. I was not holding up my end of the bargain.

The one-minute rest bell rang and the gym fell into silence. “Your punch comes from the ground. Your resistance is the only thing holding you back from landing those punches. Rotate your body and let your hands go. Let gravity do the work for you.

I climbed back into the ring and when the bell rang, I stepped forward, took a deep breath and buried my fist in her diaphragm. Her eyes popped open and I had to bite my tongue to prevent “I’m sorry” from slipping out my mouth. “Good one!” she said.

I became OBSESSED with boxing. Everything I was learning was an important lesson for my life outside the ring. When my marriage got rocky, I took it to the heavy bags. When I was exhausted from parenting I started setting a timer at home— explosive energy, then rest.

I began to wonder what other women were getting from their time in the ring and so I began interviewing the women in the gyms around NYC, following them to fights and then, eventually, to a national tournament.

This was 2011 and I realized that my passion project was intersecting with history: 2012 would be the first year women would be allowed to box in the Olympics. I pitched a story about the women trying to make that team to The New York Times and they commissioned me to follow three of them to the Olympic Trials.

Claressa Shields in her first adult tournament, Toledo, OH 2011.

It was at the last qualifying tournament that I first saw Claressa Shields fight. She was 16 and it was her first adult tournament. But rather than being intimidated fighting women twice her age, she doubled down. She and her coach Jason had their eye on the gold medal and were determined to get it.

I asked Claressa and Jason if I could interview them. It was their first interview with a journalist outside of their local paper. “We have been waiting for someone to pay attention to us,” Jason told me.

In that first interview, Claressa told me that she wanted to have ten kids before she turned 26. “Girls in Flint get pregnant real easy,” she said. But that was before boxing. Now, with her eye set on the Olympics, she was determined to use boxing to help her and her family escape the poverty she had known all her life.

Claressa and her coach Jason, Flint, Michigan, 2012

I followed Claressa back to Flint where she was living at her aunt’s house, sharing a bunk bed with three of her younger cousins. I returned to Flint several times and produced several radio, photography and video stories. I convinced my husband Joe to join me and together we produced Teen Contender for NPR.

I also made a radio series for WNYC with Marianne McCune and Karen Frillmann. We produced an event at WNYC’s Greene Space with Rosie Perez and flew Claressa and Jason out to New York to sit in the boxing ring we set up in the space and share her story.

Claressa was clearly a rising star. Her journey to London had to be documented in film but I had never made a film and time was ticking. Enter two amazing filmmakers, Zackary Canepari and Drea Cooper who were interested in Claressa’s story. Together, the three of us dropped everything and filmed her as she traveled to Canada and then China and ultimately to the London Olympics where she realized her dream. A gold medal around her neck, she returned to Flint to a parade and a quick media blitz.

And then…. crickets.

Turns out that a gold medal, all that hard work and conviction, did not translate into endorsements or even a living wage for Claressa. She struggled. She and Jason argued and eventually parted ways. We kept filming. This wasn’t the story we thought it would be. Eventually, Claressa decided she’d just have to become so good that she couldn’t be denied. She got back on her feet and trained for the Rio Olympics where she got a second gold medal.

We released T-Rex in 2015 at SXSW and it was broadcast on PBS’s Independent Lens. And then, just when we thought the story was over, T-Rex was optioned to be made into a feature film.

That film, The Fire Inside, is in theaters this week. Ryan Destiny embodies Claressa strength and charm and Brian Tyree Henry channels Coach Jason Crutchfield and speaks Jason’s words almost verbatim. It’s got amazing reviews. Claressa loves it. I do, too.

Ryan Destiny. got two extra years to train after The Fire Inside was put on hold during the pandemic.

It’s a strange and wonderful experience to follow the thread of desire, curiosity, passion and pleasure and to see all the doors that have opened and the worlds that have come into existence thirteen years on.

This whole project is the result of so many committed people — from Rachel Morrison who chose The Fire Inside for her directorial debut to Barry Jenkins who wrote a beautiful screenplay to the hundreds of people along the way who shaped this story.

Claressa is now inarguably the best woman boxer ever to have lived. She is a champion in four different weight classes and is undefeated in her professional career. In fact, she only has one defeat— ever. And that was the one we filmed for T-Rex. She changed her boxing name from T-Rex (short arms, powerful thighs) to GWOAT for Greatest Woman of ALL Time.

Following Claressa for 10 years made me a student of resilience and that led me to writing this newsletter. Claressa taught me that it’s not just discipline and hard work that get you the life of your dreams. You gotta follow desire and pleasure, no matter what.

I hope you get yourself to a theater to see The Fire Inside on the big screen or that you stream it sometime soon — hopefully with family and friends.

It’s an inspiring story for all.

Happy New Year,

Sue JAYE Johnson

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The Fire Inside, 95% on Rotten Tomatoes. Not bad! Playing in a theater near you. Here’s the trailer. And check out this glowing NYTimes review.

T-Rex, the documentary I produced with Zack and Drea. You can stream it for free this month on Vimeo.

Teen Contender, the story I produced with Joe Richman and Radio Diaries. It follows Claressa through the Olympic Trials. It won a Peabody Award, A Third Coast Gold Medal and was broadcast on NPR to millions of listeners.

Women Box with WNYC. Claressa is one of hundreds of women boxers who have been breaking into this man’s sport and demanding recognition and equality. This series I created with Marianne McCune follows many of them.

Bout Time: Early footage of Claressa before she became The GWOAT (The greatest woman of all time.) I created this with Ben Shapiro.

Follow Claressa on the socials. There’s no one like her. I promise.

Sarah Deming documented women’s boxing in her beautiful essays. This gem appeared in an anthology called The Bittersweet Science.

Vanessa Chakour, my first trainer, is now a writer and herbalist. You can find her substack here.