I was just 13 years old in March 1962 when I witnessed the tragic fight between Emile Griffith and Cuban fighter Benny “The Kid” and Paret live from Madison Square Garden on the Gillette Fight of the Week on ABC-TV. 

My father had brought home a tub of frothy green beer from his cousin Verdon’s tavern down the street, with all the accompanying free bar goodies-Brats, Polish Sausages, Pig Ears, Pickled Pig Feet, a hunk of cheese and hard salami, and a Green River for me. 

Viewing the televised fights with my dad was a weekly ritual that I eagerly looked forward to.  I was unprepared for the horror that would ensue.

 What had been a fairly mundane fight suddenly became a death match. The normally lithe and dancer-like Griffith transformed to a killing machine. His barrage of lethal blows nearly knocked Paret out of the ring. 

This unleashed rage changed the course of boxing history. Under Griffith’s withering attack, Kid Paret collapsed, never to regain consciousness. Whisked away on a stretcher, he would die in a hospital ten days later. 

The shock waves from that tragedy reverberated for years. The memory of that night also tormented Griffith for the rest of his life. 

This tragic fight is the premise for Terence Blanchard and Michael Cristofer’s searing jazz opera “Champion,” at the Metropolitan Opera now through May 13, Live In HD and in movie theaters Saturday, April 29. Visit metopera.org/season/in-cinemas.

Back in the day, professional boxers were considered celebrities, in the way that people like LeBron James and Tiger Woods are today. The tragedy surrounding the Griffith/Paret fight sounded the death knell for professional boxing as a national pastime. In our home, as in many others, the weekly ritual of watching fights on TV was no more.

When New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller created a seven-man commission to investigate the Griffith/Paret fight and professional boxing in general, there began a slow decline of professional boxing in mass popularity. 

The advent of Muhammad Ali restored some of boxing’s original luster. It wasn’t long before the ear-biting antics of Mike Tyson would plunge the sport right back into the sponge bucket.

 Years later, as a freelance writer for a sports magazine, I learned the backstory behind the Griffith/Paret tragedy. According to reports, the enmity between the two fighters occurred during the weigh-in. Paret, who is Cuban, reportedly brushed Griffith’s behind and whispered into his ear in Spanish the word ‘maricon,’ Spanish slang for today’s terms ‘gay’ or ‘queer.’ The remark enraged Griffith to the point that he had to be restrained from punching Paret’s lights out. 

It is against this backdrop that Grammy Winning and Oscar nominated trumpeter and composer Terence Blanchard was commissioned by Opera Theatre of Saint Louis in 2012, to create his first opera with libretto by Michael Cristofer, Champion: An Opera in Jazz, which was premiered at the Loretto-Hilton Center for Performing Arts in a joint commission with Opera Theatre Saint Louis and Jazz St. Louis on June 15, 2013. Denyce Graves was the headliner.  

Blanchard is known for his smash hit opera Fire Shut Up In My Bones, which made history as the first opera by a Black composer ever performed by the Met. It was also the highlight of Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 2022-23 season, which opened March 24, 2022.

In the current Met Opera production, we first meet an elderly Emile Griffith at his nursing home in Long Island, New York. Suffering from dementia, he begins to remember fragments of his past. The torment of killing a man in the ring continues to haunt him. He also continues to wrestle the inner conflict over his dual sexuality, which placed him at odds with the hyper-macho world of professional boxing.

“I keep thinking,” Griffith muses in one of Champions more poignant scenes, (and as quoted from the real-life Griffith’s biography)” how strange it is I kill a man and most people understand and forgive me. However, I love a man, and to so many people this is an unforgivable sin.”

Griffith is played as his older self by Eric Owens, the towering bass-baritone star who is well known to both Met and Lyric Opera audiences. He played Wotan in Richard Wagner’s ‘Ring’ cycle at Lyric, making history as the first African American to play that starring role. He was previously featured in the role of Alberich, in the Metropolitan Opera’s Ring Cycle. 

Owens has starred in numerous Met performances. Most notably, he led the cast of Porgy and Bess in the title role with Angel Blue in The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess in a splendid production that opened the 2019-2020 Met Opera season.  The cast album won the 2021 Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording.

The title character in the ring is played by Ryan Speedo Green. The Grammy Winning bass-baritone is one of the most in-demand international artists at the world’s leading opera houses. He was last seen as Uncle Paul in Terrence Blanchard’s Fire Shut up in my Bones in the 2021-22 season.

Soprano Latonia Moore, who is best known for her portrayal of the titled role in Verdi’s Aida, which was made famous by the great Leontyne Price, sings the role of Griffith’s mother, Emelda. Most recently, she was heralded for her portrayal as Billie in Terrence Blanchard’s landmark opera “Fire” and as the devout Serena in the Met’s explosive new staging of The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess in the September 2019 season opener.

Director James Robinson and Choreographer Camille A. Brown, the team who also brought Blanchard’s second opera “Fire’ to the Met stage in 2021, collaborate once again in this spellbinding production.

In a ‘Works and Process’ discussion and in-progress performance at the Guggenheim in New York, led by Met Opera General Manager Peter Gelb, Blanchard and the stars and director of Champion expounded on the opera’s significance.

“Camille is brilliant beyond belief,” Blanchard said glowingly of choreographer Camille A. Brown. “She takes traditional dance and modern dance, and she mixes them seamlessly, and you really can’t tell what’s, what. She looked at the scenes and based all the choreography chronologically to match each of those periods. That’s phenomenal to me in and of itself.

“You see almost everything on that stage. I mean we even have stilt walkers. We have drag queens. We even brought a complete boxing ring onto the Met stage for the first time in history. Where else could you possibly see that?” Blanchard enthused.

Ryan Speedo Green, who plays Griffith as the world champion, reportedly lost more than a hundred pounds to realistically portray his character. He also said in the discussion, that he takes boxing lessons three times a week from former world champion Michael Bentt, who is the show’s boxing consultant.  

Bentt was seen in the early scenes of the 2001 Michael Mann film “Ali” as boxer Sonny Liston. Will Smith starred in the title role as Muhammad Ali. Bentt crafted all the fight scenes in the Met’s Champion.

“I developed a taste for salmon and green beans for the first time in my life,” Green said of the strict regimen he endured to develop his character. “Before that, I never ate a vegetable unless it was smothered in something.”

Latonia Moore, who plays Griffith’s mother, said she wasn’t daunted by the prospect of singing a jazz opera. “People who know me know that I came from the world of jazz. I started my career as a jazz singer before I started singing opera.

“Don’t get me wrong. I will never leave the world of Italian opera, but I love the sense of freedom, and the tremendous support that Terence has given to me and the other performers in this opera,” she enthused.

At one point during rehearsals, when asked by Blanchard if she was comfortable with her singing role as he had written it, Moore asked if he could write her part in a slightly higher key to accommodate her voice range.

“Normally, you would see that kind of change in a week or so. Terence came back to me a half hour later with my part completely re-written. I’ve never seen that kind of turn-around in my entire career!”

The story behind Champion is based largely on the biography “Nine Ten and Out! The Two Worlds of Emile Griffith (AuthorHouse-2008), by Ron Ross.

 Director James Robinson, who was named Artistic Director of Opera Theatre Saint Louis in 2009, enlisted Blanchard’s help in bringing Griffith’s story to life on the opera stage. 

“When I arrived in St. Louis, the idea was presented to me to create a jazz opera. At first, they wanted me to commission a small work, but I said, ‘Why not a big work?’

“I was given a list of names of jazz composers, and Terence’s name immediately stood out, primarily because I was a big fan of his work in film. I knew that he had strong dramatic instincts.”

Months went by before Robinson would be presented with a subject for this new jazz opera. “We needed a subject badly. Finally, one night Terence called me and said, ‘I want to do an opera about Emile Griffith.’

“’Terrific! We have a subject!’ Then I said. “Whose Emile Griffith?” 

After reading the Ross biography on Griffith, Robinson was ready to move ahead with commissioning Blanchard to write the opera. “The Griffith story certainly has all the elements of tragedy. It is, indeed, a very operatic story.”

For Blanchard, who has written numerous film scores, most notably for Spike Lee, seeing his writing for Champion on the Met stage was a deeply emotional experience. 

“I mean I’m the guy who wrote this! When I saw Eric Owens singing my work on stage, I was moved to tears!

Blanchard concluded, “We as jazz artists are always telling our personal stories through music. In presenting Champion, we hope to give that experience to everyone who sees it.”

Champion is not to be missed. The compelling story line, terrific music, singing, and dancing are like nothing ever seen on the opera stage. In theaters Sat. April 29.

Dwight Casimere is Times Weekly Living/Entertainment writer.