‘King Richard’: Understanding the Real Richard Williams, Father and Coach to Venus and Serena

For years during the trailblazing tennis careers of his daughters Venus and Serena, Richard Williams was an animated public presence—waving signs from the crowd, offering bombastic soundbites, and even, on occasion, dancing on a television booth.

But when Richard, now 79, learned that he was going to be the subject of a movie, King Richard, with Will Smith playing him, he balked at the idea.

“He’d say, ‘I don’t know if I want them to do the film. I don’t want people to hate me,’” remembers Isha Price, Venus and Serena’s older half sister—a lawyer who, along with Venus and Serena, is credited as an executive producer on the movie.

“I’m like, ‘Daddy, first of all, we would never be a part of anything where people were going to vilify you [just] because they didn’t understand you. But we got to tell the truth.’ He said, ‘Oh, I always want you to be honest.’”

Admits King Richard producer Trevor White in a separate interview, “I think there’s a sensitivity to the way in which Richard used to be portrayed in the media, and the family wanted to make sure we weren’t after that kind of false portrayal.”

Price, the lynchpin between the film and her family, says she was convinced to participate after reading Zach Baylin’s script and realizing that Baylin, Trevor, and fellow King Richard producer Tim White genuinely wanted the family’s cooperation. As Price explained to her family members, “This is technically our story. But somebody is going to tell it eventually. Why not let us, at least, tell the truth and have our own voice out there and not have it be some fabricated thing about stuff that never happened, or things that people don’t understand? That’s where you get to the vilification of certain people.”

Though Richard stayed removed from the process, the rest of the family got involved. Serena and Venus submitted script feedback; their sister Lyndrea Price worked in the costume department; and Isha helped with everything from choosing the director, Reinaldo Marcus Green, to making sure minute details of her family life were accurately depicted. (“I was mad that the van was dusty,” laughs Isha about one nitpick. “Daddy washed the van every week.”) Isha, Venus, and Williams matriarch Oracene Price also spent considerable time speaking with the filmmakers to make sure that they understood the private side of Richard Williams.

“In the ’90s and the early 2000s, when he was much more forward-facing, Richard was a very controversial and contentious figure in the tennis world,” says Baylin. “He really saw his job as their coach being not just about what was happening on the court, but about being their hype man. At the time, I think people saw that somewhat contentiously. But what was brilliant was he knew that without the resources [to fund Venus and Serena’s tennis training], he was going to have to build up this aura and myth around them to get people to invest in them.… I think the outward impression was that that bombastic-ness and that contentiousness would’ve been there in the family as well. But it was really the opposite. He was an extremely soft and encouraging father and coach.”

Adds Isha, “There were a lot of tennis parents out there that were more villainous. The reason that he took us out of—or took Venus and Serena out of—the juniors was because of the way that the parents were acting.” He wanted to protect his daughters from that environment, she says. “We wanted that to be shown.”

Baylin especially valued input from Oracene, a more private figure who also coached her daughters and committed to the family dream of them becoming world champions.