It’s impossible not to think of Muhammad Ali when viewing O.J.: Made in America, filmmaker Ezra Edelman’s absorbing five-part, seven-and-a-half-hour documentary about the rise and fall of O.J. Simpson for ESPN’s venerable 30 for 30 series. When Muhammad Ali died on June 3 at the age of 74, the world didn’t just mourn the loss of a gifted athlete, it also lamented the loss of a fiery political figure. He was someone who spoke truth to power, who through his actions declared that “Black Lives Matter,” who refused to let the world forget that he was both black and Muslim, no matter what the cost. Those convictions cost him dearly.
O.J. Simpson was a serial abuser, full stop. When they first met, Nicole was 18, and he was still married to his first wife, Marguerite (who wasn’t interviewed for this documentary—how different things might be if we had her perspective on all that has transpired). David LeBon, a friend and roommate of Nicole’s, mentioned that the night after O.J. and Nicole met, she came back with ripped jeans and told him O.J. had been “a little bit forceful.” O.J. terrorized Nicole throughout their entire marriage. Eight times the police made domestic violence calls to their house on. And all eight times, the police left O.J. alone with Nicole afterward. Ironically, the same LAPD accused during the trial of conspiring to frame O.J. actually spent years working in his favor.
And what a fall it was. After O.J. was acquitted of double homicide in 1995, his life spiraled into a fog of drug and alcohol abuse, bizarre reality-show appearances, transparently insincere attempts to ingratiate himself with black people, and a disastrous attempt to retrieve his sports memorabilia in Las Vegas. It was this attempt that led to a 33-year prison sentence for armed robbery and kidnapping.
