4/4. The Closest Thing to Dying. Telling the story of what is considered the greatest fight of all time -the 1975 "Thrilla in Manila" between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. Set against the backdrop of the civil rights struggle and Black Power politics, it was also a world in which Ali had emerged as an unlikely crusader against the injustices of Vietnam. Frazier, an Olympic hero, had to endure the scorn and derision of his own race fuelled by Ali's slurs. When the two entered the ring, bitterness had become hatred, but had the demands of the audience and the enmity between the fighters gone too far?
Producer Tom Ware ; Executive producer Michael Poole