IT’S no wonder Hollywood loves his story too.
Mike Tyson, 54, if he’s not already immortalised through boxing, will have his name in lights with a biopic – and Oscar-winning actor Jamie Foxx taking on the lead role.
And it will, surely, feature Iron Mike’s most controversial moments during what has been the most colourful career a sports star could ever have.
Accusations of being violent towards a former wife, a self-confessed addiction to cocaine and a rape conviction that led to time behind bars add to his mystique outside the ring.
In the ring, he famously bit the ear off an opponent and spat it out – and bragged about putting opponents in a body bag.
Controversy has dogged Tyson, set to make his long-awaited comeback on November 28 in an exhibition fight against Roy Jones Jr, throughout his life.
YOUNG THUG
Tyson grew up in modest surroundings in Brooklyn and immediately fell into trouble.
Constantly bullied as a kid because of his weight and a lisp, he found his identity by robbing houses, beating people up and doing drugs.
He ran with the local Rutland Road crew – a gang of youths who called themselves the ‘Cats’.
He claimed in his book Undisputed Truth that he snorted his first line of coke aged 11.
Before he turned 13, Tyson had been arrested an astonishing 38 times.
Later, he would spend time in and out of a juvenile detention centre in the Bronx called Spofford.
At 14, Tyson met legendary trainer Cus D’Amato – who channeled the boy’s aggression and moulded him into the meanest fighter the world has ever seen.
Cus gave Tyson a mantra – “The best fighter in the world. Nobody can beat me,” which the aspiring boxer would repeat over and over again.
TRAPPINGS OF FAME
As Tyson became one of the most famous and wealthiest sports stars on the planet, he had women throwing themselves at him.
His most explosive love affair was with first wife Robin Givens from 1988 to 1989.
They married 11 months after their first date, on which they were reportedly joined by her mother and publicist.
According to Tyson, they had a hastily arranged wedding when Givens announced she was pregnant.
He had already given Givens and her mum £3million to buy a New Jersey estate, as well as put £6.5million in another account for the pair.
But shortly after money was exchanged, Robin told Mike she’d had a miscarriage.
The pair later appeared in a cringe-worthy interview with US journalist Barbara Walters, where Givens revealed her three-month marriage to Tyson was “torture, pure hell, worse than anything I could possibly imagine”.
Asked if Tyson ever hit her, Givens said: “He shakes, he pushes, he… swings. Sometimes I think he’s trying to scare me.
“There were times that it happened that I thought I could handle it, and just recently, I have become afraid. I mean, very, very much afraid.”
Givens filed for divorce soon after the interview.
Years later, Tyson admitted in another book Fire and Fear: The Inside Story of Mike Tyson that Givens was on the receiving end of the best punch he’s ever thrown.
CAREER IN TATTERS
In 1991, Tyson was arrested for the rape of 18-year-old model Desiree Washington, a former Miss Black Rhode Island, in a hotel room in Indianapolis.
He was soon put on trial at the Marion County superior court, with his career and future in jeopardy.
Washington’s story was corroborated by Tyson’s then-chauffeur Virginia Foster, who revealed the beauty’s state of shock moments after the incident.
ER physician Thomas Richardson, who examined Washington, provided further testimony that her physical condition was consistent with rape.
Despite Tyson’s protestations that Washington had given him full consent, he was sentenced to six years in prison in 1992 along with four years of probation.
He was just 25 at the time and it looked like he had wasted his early potential.
SEX OFFENDER
In the past, Tyson has been open about his sexual endeavours.
He confessed to enjoying orgies and sleeping with multiple women in his heyday.
And in prison he got his fix too.
Random female visitors would visit him in prison just to have sex with him, which he happily obliged with.
Then, Tyson got involved with a prison drug counsellor after he gave her around £8,000 to fix her roof.
”I was having so much sex that I was too tired to even to go the gym and work out,” Tyson wrote.
“I’d just stay in my cell all day.”
HOLYFIELD SCANDAL
After serving three years of his sentence, Tyson was on the comeback trail and regained his crown as the king of the heavyweight division.
He dispensed of Peter McNeeley, Buster Mathis Jr, Frank Bruno and Bruce Seldon with ease – winning both the WBC and WBA belts along the way.
However, he met his match against Evander Holyfield.
After losing the first fight, the rematch became infamous for a shocking moment that shook the boxing world.
At the end of the third round, Tyson was disqualified for biting Holyfield on both ears.
The final chomp was so severe a piece of Holyfield’s right ear was found on the ring floor after the fight.
Tyson’s purse was suspended, his boxing licence was rescinded and he was fined around £2million.
DETACHABLE PENIS
Tyson has admitted his problems with drug abuse – most notably cocaine.
He used throughout his career, even before big fights as his habit spiralled out of control.
“I was a full-blown cokehead,” Tyson said in Undisputed Truth.
“The history of war is the history of drugs. Every great general and warrior from the beginning of time was high.”
And Tyson found a novel way to cheat drug tests, while he snorted lines of powder before stepping in the ring.
He would use a fake penis filled with someone else’s urine he and his entourage called the ‘whizzer’.
However, the ‘whizzer’ failed him in 2000 when he tested positive for marijuana and was fined £150,000.
NOW A DRUG DEALER
After finding redemption in Hollywood – starring in films including The Hangover – Tyson has rebuilt his life.
But it’s by drugs – once his scourge – he’s now making his millions from.
In 2016, he set up Tyson Holistic – selling cannabis products as potent as one of his uppercuts.
Tyson is believed to earn around £500,000-per-month through his business – based in California where growing and selling cannabis products is regulated and legal – that offers premium marijuana strains, edibles and extracts.
In 2019, he launched a small pop-up music extravaganza he called the Kind Music Festival.
He walked around the site, greeting revellers, who enjoyed acts including Miguel and A$AP Ferg, while smoking joints.
And in his sights Tyson has a cannabis-themed theme park called the Tyson Ranch in the works.
Described as the “wonderland of weed”, guests will be able smoke marijuana anywhere within the resort, except where alcohol is sold.
Tyson just can’t stop courting controversy.
