This documentary tracks the life of African
American Tennis star Arthur Ashe who was a pioneering radical despite his restrained style
A clip towards the end of this respectful documentary shows
Barack Obama revealing that his role-model heroes were Muhammad Ali and Arthur Ashe. Surely, Ashe had to be the bigger influence: the only black man ever to have won
Wimbledon was a famously someone with a thoughtful, non-strident personality whom the white tennis establishment found to be highly acceptable. Ashe himself, though sympathetic to the new black radicalism of the 1960s was, in terms of style, entirely apart from it, and this film recounts his stoicism at enduring the occasional “Uncle Tom” jibe.
Perhaps this was crystallised by his decision to ignore the boycotts against apartheid
South Africa and play there as a way of accelerating integration, despite the fact that he was for a long time refused a visa precisely because of his fulminations against apartheid. This strategy had a non-Hollywood ending: he lost in the singles final there in 1973 to his old rival Jimmy Connors. Later, Nelson Mandela embraced Ashe in public and called him “my brother”.
Citizen Ashe is in cinemas from 10 December.