George Foreman has conquered many opponents, but he wasn’t eager for a rematch with TV.
The boxing great had struck out with a short-lived 1993 sitcom, George, and didn’t much care for learning lines and hitting his marks, calling it “the hardest job I ever had.” But none of that is an issue on TV Land‘s Family Foreman (Wednesdays beginning July 16), which allows him to just be himself while the cameras follow him in his daily life as a husband, father, sporting legend, ordained minister and insanely successful businessman. Perhaps you’ve heard of his grill.
Viewers will get to see all parts of Foreman’s life, whether it’s pitching one of his many products, giving motivational speeches, watching his Indy Racing League team in action or even contemplating another comeback in the ring. They will also get to know his family, which is probably most famous for including five sons all named George. (They do have nicknames to avoid confusion.)
The former two-time champ — who made history after regaining the heavyweight title at age 45 — shared some of his thoughts with us.
Tell me about Family Foreman. What did you think when you were approached with this idea?
I’d done a sitcom originally called George a few years back, and it was the hardest job I ever had in my life. I can remember thinking, “I had to go into boxing to get away from working.” They locked me in this studio with these scripts I’d have to remember … But I love television. It was an opportunity to do another TV show. This time, it’d be reality. There weren’t any lines. Just be myself. I had a hard time convincing my wife, of course. They had to make certain she was in. But once she came onboard, it was a pleasure, really. Because since 1968, my life has been pretty much public … so now this is a grand opportunity to share our aspect of it. The kids get a chance to let everybody know they — you walk up to someone and — that’s the most horrible thing that can happen — and say, “Hey, that’s George Foreman’s daughter!” “That’s George Foreman’s son!” You can’t have that. That’s not much of an identity. … They’ll find something out about them as individuals, so I think every celebrity should have one of these shows.
Your children were onboard right away, then?
The kids loved it. They got a chance to show some of their [talents]… football players, athletes, and even a little taste of what could be a love life. So they enjoyed it. And I’m a minister, too, and you know how it is, other than being a boxer I think the worst thing you can grow up being is a minister’s son. So they were showing all of the young people, “Hey, I’m not a holy roller. Look at me. I got class. I got taste.” So I think it worked out just fine.
How much of the show is going to be George the family man vs. George the boxing great vs. George the minister vs. George the grill guru, etc.?
It’s well-rounded, because when the show took us on, they didn’t know which way to go — because I’ve got so many ways you can take, they just decided, “Let’s zigzag and see what catches.” Every aspect of the George Foreman family life is explored. You even see us with part of a racing team with Indy Car Racing team that we own.
Your kids are growing up a lot different than you did. Is it hard relating to them in some ways?
That’s been really rough for me, because I remember my oldest son, I heard him arguing in the bedroom one morning in the ’80s. He didn’t want to wear a certain amount of clothes, and my wife said, “Oh yes, you are.” He said, “I don’t want to look poor.” I said, “Man, ‘poor’? I never said that, we said ‘po.'” So I took him back to all the places where I lived and told him the story of how I’d gotten in trouble. For a moment, he was like, “You’re not my dad. This is some kind of trick.” Because they’d grown up in this upper middle-class life and had no idea where I’d really come from. It can get away from you. I shocked him. Giving him my background, and letting him see a little bit of it so he can try to make that connection so they can appreciate where we all are. That hasn’t been easy.
One of your sons was involved in a reality show prior to this one, Filthy Rich: Cattle Drive.
That’s right. That was George III, we call him Monk. That was really nice for him, because I brought him up on the ranch, so he didn’t panic. All the horses and nature was kind of easy for him. It was a good reality for him because he got the chance to visit with other people who had other things going for them as well. He’s accustomed to television. He’s become my manager. He was my manager then, as a matter of fact. He graduated from Rice University and automatically just took over whatever I was doing. It was his idea to do [Family Foreman]. He said, “I want you in television.” I didn’t want to tell him, I said, “Those sitcoms are hard work.” So we did “American Inventors,” that was part of his doing, too. He’s still got other things. He gets into a lot of trouble on this reality show himself.
You famously named all five of your sons George, but gave them nicknames to tell them apart. What are they, from George II to George VI?
There’s Little George, who’s the tallest of all. Then there’s Monk, Big Wheel, Red and Joe. Even they get kind of confusing sometimes. Because I can hardly remember George, now I got to remember nicknames? So most of the time everybody’s being called George. You don’t make any mistakes that way.
What do you hope people will get out of the show?
It’s a big hope that they find out, not just about George Foreman, but celebrities, too. There’s so many celebrities today, and so many people look at us like, “You mean you’re over here where we are? You’re doing what we do?” Like I’m something other than just a regular person. Of course, my kids, a lot of them have grown up and just because their name was George Foreman when I was boxing, people thought, “Hey, you should want to fight.” And that was the last thing on their minds. Sometimes you got to look at people and say, “Oh, he’s not like that. That’s his daddy. Or that’s his mother. They’re not like that.” It’s individuals and hopefully it’ll press other celebrities to get deep into these reality shows. It’s great. Tell people about your lives.
What was it like shooting the show? Were the cameras around all the time?
Most of the days we decided, “Let’s do camera.” Sometimes it’s pretty sneaky, too, because once a camera is in your house, you don’t know when it’s on you, running your mouth sometimes. You’re like, “Hey, cut that off!” But it’s too late. We signed on to be ourselves. I tell people, if you do a reality show, you better be the way you are, because if you’re not, you’re going to get caught.
Were you worried about how your family will be portrayed?
No, I really wasn’t. You know, behind the scenes — and I mean literally behind — you want to make sure you’ve done your sit-ups, in case the camera catches you from behind. All of us were worried about that. Sometimes we look at scenes and go back over them, the only thing everybody was worried about is, “Man, I need to lose a couple pounds.”
Do you watch many reality shows?
I’ve watched a lot of them. I’ve never been crazy about them. I was really happy to see when Whitney Houston did one. Anything that Whitney Houston would do, I fell in love with. I just love Whitney Houston. It didn’t last long, but I loved that show.
Have you been able to watch Family Foreman?
Yeah, we’ve seen some and we cut and looked at them. I try to stay out of it, because I’ve been in business long enough with products and publicity to know to trust other people who are directing and producing or whatever. Trust their judgment, because I’ve seen publicity shots I hated and they became the most sought-after shots in the world I’ve done, so I just learned to go along. I see my family and watch them watching some of the stuff going on with some of the Family Foreman things. If they’re laughing and smiling, I just walk away and don’t pay any attention. As long as they’re happy, I’m happy.
Will there be future seasons of Family Foreman?
You just never know on television. I tell anyone who’s going to be in movies and television, enjoy yourself but don’t fall in love with it. It’s like a girl who may love you today and hate you tomorrow. Have fun. Every day should be about fun and laughter, because it’s a privilege to be on television. I mean, it’s a privilege.
Will you do any boxing on Family Foreman?
I tried to make a comeback again. I really wanted to make a comeback. That’s the worst thing to get out of your mind, that you can’t do it anymore. You cannot, you better not, and that’s scary. You see yourself, the reruns, and it’s not like you look back and laugh at that. It’s kind of a hurting thing. I wanted to be an athlete since 1966. In ’67, I had my first boxing match. Sixty-seven, now. Can you imagine that? It’s part of me. And someone telling you that’s the end of it? Uh-uh, that hurts. That was some reality there.
Best I could do now is beat a kitchen boy, a water boy.
Are you still involved with boxing?
I did [announcing] HBO for 13 years. I kept doing it for three years to help my publicity, another three years because my wife told me they needed me, then another three years. I kept thinking, “I’m going to be doing this the rest of my life.” And, I’m emotional like everyone else, some guy you followed for three years starts losing, the crowd will applaud him because he lost. That got to me a little bit. So, I said after 13 years I was done. I’m going to try something else, because there’s no objectivity in that business. I was getting a little hurt there. Every now and then they’ve had me back on as a guest broadcaster. And I’ll do that whenever they ask me to, because they did real well when I was on there, so I owe them a lot. Sometimes I go back, but oh boy I’m telling you to follow a guy for two years who’s undefeated, and then he loses a split decision you feel like he should have won and it happens over and over and over, I’m telling you after awhile you need to lay down on the couch and have someone talk to you. I need an ambulance, somebody check me out, because it hurts.
How do you think boxing’s doing these days?
There’s no popular heavyweight. Boxing needs a real popular heavyweight champion. He’s got to be an American. No matter how — it’s like the America’s Cup, you need an American to be heavyweight champion of the world, then boxing is going to be special. Even if a European or African or whatever nation beats him, a rematch is going to be bigger. And we don’t have that now, and it suffers because of that. I don’t know where the American heavyweights are now. They’re not in football, believe me, because you should see those guys when they start a fight. They don’t know how to fight. I can tell you, in basketball, they’re not there either. But we need an American heavyweight and boxing will live again.
