By Lauren Young
Staff Writer
As expressed by an announcer during the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, Tonya Harding’s broken shoelace situation during the Ladies’ Free Skate was truly a “bizarre, real-life movie” come to life. And that’s exactly the emotion Craig Gillespie creates in the explosive comedy-drama “I, Tonya.”
“I, Tonya” plays out as a National Enquirer headliner, putting a sarcastic spin on what is commonly referred to as the “Goodfellas” of figure skating. Director Craig Gillespie’s biopic is comically accurate, ironically enough for a story of many contradicting “truths.”
“America. They want someone to love, but they want someone to hate, and the haters always say, ‘Tonya, tell the truth!’ There’s no such thing as the truth,” tells Margot Robbie as 1991 U.S figure skating champion and two-time Olympian Tonya Harding. “Everyone has their own truth.”
On Jan. 6, 1994, an unknown man walked up to figure skater Nancy Kerrigan during a practice session two days before the Olympic trials and struck her just above the knee with a metal baton. The attack was later discovered to be perpetrated by a man hired by the husband and bodyguard of Kerrigan’s chief rival on the U.S. Olympic team, Tonya Harding.
The film plays out as a mock documentary, both recreated and imagined. “Interviews” from the characters recount this stranger-than-fiction tale with wildly separate accounts of the same events. Even the queen of the triple axel herself, portrayed by a shining performance from Robbie, is an unreliable narrator.
Just as carbon dioxide turns to diamonds after enduring over 700,000 pounds of pressure, Harding’s mother was that pressure makes perfect, and anger was the driving force of Tonya’s career. Allison Janney gives a mirror characterization of Harding’s chain-smoking mother LaVona Golden, whose Midas touch manifests in degradation and abuse.
Despite her sharp tongue, the devil herself plays a part in exposing Tonya’s internal desire for approval and acceptance. However, there is no sympathy for this devil, as her representation of tough love is more tough than love. Harding endures both physical and mental abuse throughout her childhood, characterized by incidents of hairbrush beatings and knife-throwing (which her mother claims only happened once).
While practicing at the ice rink at age 15, Harding meets Jeff Gillooly, excellently portrayed by Sebastian Stan, who was 18 at the time. With him is best friend Shawn Eckardt, portrayed by Paul Walter Hauser, who hilariously stands out as the mastermind behind what is commonly referred to as “The Incident.”
Tonya soon finds her career on thin ice when Gillooly plans to take down her rival, Kerrigan, with fumbling bodyguard Eckardt, who brags to be an internationally-acclaimed counterterrorism expert, despite there being no confirmation of his claims. While Harding was able to cover her facial wounds with concealer, she wasn’t able to conceal her affiliation with the knee-bashing incident, though she denies it to this day.
In Harding’s guilty plea, she admitted to “conspiring to hinder prosecution,” a charge which resulted in three years’ probation, $160,000 in fines, 500 community service hours and an eternal ban from U.S. figure skating. The U.S. Figure Skating Association additionally stripped her of her 1994 National Figure Skating Championship title. Despite Harding alleged ignorance to the masterplan, her reputation was inevitably disgraced, and her name became synonymous with a tabloid punchline.
The low budget film, shot in 31 days, provides raunchy yet honest commentary on class-consciousness, domestic abuse and the reality of Olympic figure skating as Harding struggles to embody the “wholesome” image of an American figure skater.
Harding was paid a fee plus a percentage of the film profits for her life rights. She supports the message of the film and it’s “truth,” and was in contact with the writers of “I, Tonya” throughout the process and production.
Kerrigan says she never got a direct apology from Harding for what happened at the 1994 Olympics to this day.
“I, Tonya” is currently playing at Regal Cinemas in Destiny USA.
