Cruiserweight boxer Tony Bellew was "expecting Jeremy Beadle to pop up at any moment" when his mobile phone rang and the voice claimed to be a Hollywood director wanting him for the movie 'Creed’, the seventh film in the 'Rocky' series. But it proved no prank. A few months later, he was acting in fight scenes alongside Sylvester Stallone, and advising on the action. The movie opens in cinemas in the UK next week, with Bellew as one of its gritty, bullish characters.
Bellew recalls that day clearly, in August 2014, feeling wretched on his way home after witnessing his beloved Everton Football Club take a 3-6 hammering by Chelsea. "It was early in the season, Costa comes to Goodison, runs riot, and I walked out heartbroken. Then my phone rang. I remember the exact time because it was the last time I could have a takeaway before going into camp to face Nathan Cleverly for the second time. It was the biggest fight of my life and if I lost it I was going to retire. That was how much it meant to me."
"This guy says 'Hey Tony, I'm calling you on behalf of MGM, Sylvester Stallone and Kevin King Templeton. Would you play the world champion in the next Rocky movie?' My repIy was simply 'Are you having a f------- laugh? I only listened to him because I thought it would cheer me up. He phoned me back four times in the next hour. When I told my wife Rachael she looked at me like I was mad."
Stallone, left, and Bellew in Creed
Yet the rest is history, and Bellew spent three months filming the movie in Philadelphia. It's out next week, with Bellew feeling that director Ryan Coogler may just have created something a little special. They wanted a real fighter, a character from the streets, and in Bellew, they had exactly that. "Ryan wanted a fighter for the movie, not an actor. I'm 'Pretty' Ricky Conlan. I've been paid more for fights than I got for this," Bellew told me as he recalled the filming, the training and the experience as we sat on the steps of the majestic St George's Hall in Liverpool. "What it's done is given me an opportunity. That was the reason why I took it.”
But it also made him reflect. How boxing "has chosen" him, how his ancestry is a mix of African, and American-Indian on his mother's side, and Irish on his father's line, and how a restlessness has always engulfed him, his soul calm when he fights.
For Bellew, the son of a bank robber, the grandson of a policeman, proud father and Liverpudlian, working with Stallone, he told me, was special. "It was nice being around Sly. He always gave me great words of advice. The best bit of advice he gave me was basically to visualise someone else's face on Michael B Jordan's (who plays Adonis Creed) body. So it was Nathan Cleverly's face on Mike's body.”
• Boxing review 2015
No surprise there. Bellew returned to defeat Cleverly in that second contest, and is on the verge of fighting for the World Cruiserweight title this year, having twice been on the wrong end of defeats in world title challenges at light-welterweight. The days 'playing' a world champion, talking to Stallone about ups and downs in life, and how the 'downs' prepare you for the powerful moments in life, are potent in Bellew's psyche this year.
"Sometimes I'd pinch myself. Sly took me out for a meal one night and we talked. He said Dolph Lundgren punched him in the rib one time during Rocky -- punched him so hard it pierced his lung. He was in hospital in the intensive care unit. There were so many things. He'd sparred with the likes of Joe Frazier. He got in the ring with Larry Holmes and sparred with Roberto Duran. Boxing legends, some of them the very greatest."
Self-belief, says Bellew, oozed from Stallone, who is often spoken by those around him as an irrepressible force of nature. "That was him," agreed Bellew. "For a man of his age, the shape he's in is unbelievable. He works very hard, a lot of hours. The guy is still doing Rambo movies. At age 68, I expect to be strapped to the couch with the remote control like Jim Royle. This guy is rolling around doing cartwheels and blasting off huge guns. I didn't want to talk boxing with him, I wanted to talk about the Rambo movies. I love Rambo. I got talking about the Rambo movies...."
Bellew turned into a fan boy.
"He said he'd shot a 40 calibre gun that was so powerful he'd never felt anything like it. I was like, wow, I'd love to see that. He said it was an unbelievable thing. The gun could take down big trees. He's an amazing man who has done an awful lot in that business."
Bellew beat Masternak, right, last month
"He's very knowledgeable on boxing and he had the utmost respect for boxers, wrestlers, UFC guys. He has big respect for them because he knows the pain they go through in the training and in the fight. He's done the training. He's experienced the combat side of training. He's taken punches. He's taken shots from bigger guys. It was an amazing experience, and I hope people enjoy the movie."
Since the filming of the movie, Bellew has won four fights straight, including revenge over Cleverly, and claimed the vacant European cruiserweight title over Mateusz Masternak last month. Bellew's hunger to win a world title is undiminished, and ranked in the top 10 with three sanctioning bodies - highest No 4 with the World Boxing Organisation - promoter Eddie Hearn has promised the 33-year-old a world title shot this year. That crown will be a bonus for Bellew, who says he never wants to see any of his three sons fight for a living.
"I never dreamed an ABA (UK amateur national) title, but the more I've won, the more hungry I've got and the harder I train. I don't claim to be the best boxer in the world. What I claim to do is give 100% when I get in that ring. I just believe I can win a world title. The one place in the world world where I can feel like I'm completely in control, at home, is in a ring. I love the walk to the ring, the crowd, the landing of a punch. I sometimes don't mind taking a punch to wake me up. I don't believe I chose boxing, boxing chose me." Just as 'Rocky Balboa' himself might have said. And that’s what Bellew is - a real life Rocky story.
In April last year, Hollywood star of action movies Stallone admitted that he had regretted not trying to buy Everton several years ago. The Rocky star supports the Blues through his friendship with club director Robert Earl and ties with Planet Hollywood and has even visited Goodison Park for matches.
Stallone had been in a position to offer to purchase the club eight years ago, but says the wealth of Premiership football clubs is now out of his financial reach. could no longer afford Stallone said: "If I knew what I know now I’d have snapped it up. That was when football clubs were affordable but now it’s a billionaire’s game."
Creed opens in UK cinemas on Friday, January 15.
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