Monday, Dec. 12, 2005 | 9:28 a.m.
Ron Kantowski's column appears on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at [email protected] or (702) 259-4088.
Last Wednesday, I was speaking to Marc Ratner, the Nevada State Athletic Commission executive director, when I heard what sounded like a trumpet fanfare and the dull thud of body shots coming over his cell phone.
"Where are you?" I asked the busiest man on the Las Vegas sports scene.
"Ringside at Mandalay Bay. I'm in the new Rocky movie," Ratner said.
Ratner plays himself. So, too, I think, does Rocky Balboa. Yo, Adrian. I'm not buying that Sylvester Stallone pseudonym he's been using between fights.
"This is pretty cool. You oughta come down," Ratner said.
So I did. I didn't have a credential or anything like that. And I really had no desire to sign a bunch of forms to become one of the hundreds of extras who formed the "crowd" for Rocky's climactic fight with light-heavyweight champ Antonio Tarver -- a pretty good name for a real-life fighter, but not as cool as Mason "The Line" Dixon, Tarver's character in the latest installment of the Rocky -- well, what's three after a trilogy? -- series.
But I did have a clipboard and a confident wave. It was Michael Keaton, in his role as an editor in "The Paper," who said a clipboard and a confident wave will get you into anywhere.
It also helps to know your way around the bowels of the Mandalay Bay Events Center. Within minutes, I was past the last "Movie Being Shot, Absolutely No Admittance" sign, tossed my clipboard into the trash can on top of Bernard Hopkins' career and took my usual seat in the rear of the press section.
Ratner was right. Being on location of a movie set is pretty cool.
The first thing I noticed was the attention to detail. There were a bunch of extras sitting in the press section instead of the real-life boxing media, but they didn't appear to be working, either. Very realistic.
The rest of the arena looked kind of eerie. Most of the seats had dummies in them, that when viewed at a distance or through the magic of film, will achieve the effect of a capacity crowd. My first thought was that UNLV should borrow these props for home basketball games. But if authenticity was the goal, this is where the producers erred.
Upon closer inspection, the torsos of the female dummies were made of wood. Anybody who has been to a real pay-per-view fight and made it down to ringside knows these are almost always made of silicone.
As for what was happening in the ring, there was a lot of preparation time but only sporadic activity. In other words, it was just like a Chris Byrd fight. Every so often, a remarkably chiseled (especially for 59 years old) Stallone would ask the water boy to spray him down with fake perspiration, then he and Tarver would launch pantomined haymakers while the crowd pantomined going crazy, like it would were Diego Corrales and Jose Luis Castillo fighting for real.
This must have been the sequence where Bill Conti plays dramatic soundtrack music over the boxing action. Or Frank Stallone sings.
"Be patient," said a woman who was directing the extras with a microphone. "We're gonna shoot the 10th round next. That's the one where you get to cheer."
The 10th must have been an important scene, because Rocky retreated to his trailer (or the blackjack table) for a long time while Paulie (actor Burt Young) entertained the extras by posing for pictures and signing autographs.
It was worth the wait. I got to witness a knockdown that was so real looking that referee Joe Cortez, who also was playing himself, refused to call it a slip.
Based on what I saw and have read -- and I'm probably going to hate saying this -- I've got high hopes that "Rocky Balboa" may finally be the sequel that returns Rocky to his, and the franchise's, gritty roots. That it's going to be more about the characters and their emotions than a caricature of the fight game.
Anyway, that's what one of the producers kept telling the extras.
"This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience," he said repeatedly.
Unless you've got a clipboard and a confident wave. Then you can always come back tomorrow.
Ron Kantowski can be reached at 259-4088 or at [email protected].
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