How Ryan Destiny Managed to Keep ‘The Fire Inside’

The ascent from starring on a hit television show to booking the lead in a buzzy film has become increasingly common with this new class of movie stars. But where things went drastically different for actress Ryan Destiny is that her Independent Spirit Award-nominated performance in boxing biopic “The Fire Inside” was five years in the making—delayed by a global pandemic, the film going into turnaround, a new studio picking it up, and her primary scene partner being recast.

Speaking to IndieWire over Zoom about her turn in Oscar-nominated cinematographer Rachel Morrison’s directorial debut as Olympic champion boxer Claressa Shields, the only American in her sport to win back-to-back gold medals, Destiny said “I definitely didn’t think I would get it. Because I knew it was so competitive. Something like this, a project like this, especially with Barry Jenkins attached and Rachel attached, and the studio at that time, Universal was attached—all of the things. This is a dream role for a lot of people, including myself. So I didn’t think that they would look twice at me to be quite honest.”

Being first cast for the project, then known as “Flint Strong,” in 2019, the Detroit native was fresh off of a lead role in Fox’s musical drama “Star,” created by Lee Daniels. She had lined up a pivotal recurring role in the Freeform sitcom “Grown-ish,” to air in early 2020, but the project penned by Oscar winner Jenkins was meant to serve as her big break into film. An opportunity to announce herself in a different light, playing a fellow Michigander that overcame the odds being stacked against her.

It was only days into shooting when the world shut down due to COVID-19, then another year waiting, only to hear final word from Morrison that the studio was dropping the film. “It was just really heartbreaking for me, and it felt like the world was ending. It sounds so dramatic, but it felt that way. I knew how rare a project like this is. I was in that headspace of me feeling like this is never going to happen again,” said Destiny. “On top of our industry changing so fast. Within the time of the pandemic too, it was just so many question marks across the board. So I was very, very scared. And then it wasn’t until months later that we finally got good news that Amazon MGM had picked us back up again. So that was insane, to be able to say that you got a second chance because we know that there are so many other productions that didn’t.”

Actress Ryan Destiny and director Rachel Morrison on the set of ‘The Fire Inside’. Sabrina Lantos / Amazon MGM Studios /Courtesy Everett Collection

She gives special credit to Morrison for willing the film back into existence. “It really showed in how much passion she had to literally never give up on this film. Without her I don’t know if it still would’ve been coming out today. She had an incredible amount of fight to continue to get this film off of the ground and kept me in the loop the entire time and didn’t give up on me either,” said Destiny. “All these things that could have happened, she just did not allow it to happen. So I’m really thankful for her.”

It was the energy the actress needed coming out of the break. “I went into a little bit of a depressive mode, to be quite honest, where everything just felt very up in the air,” she said. “Once it clicked that, ‘Oh, this is definitely not happening anytime soon.’ That’s when I went into just this, “All right, I’m just here with my family. Whatever my brain can handle is what I’m going to do.’” 

Though it took a little time to mentally and physically get back in fighting shape once the film was back on, the time away ultimately felt like it was for the best. For instance, Shields’ achievements take on new meaning in today’s context. “The climate that we’re in, it would’ve been a way bigger thing now than it was then. People are paying way more attention now to a lot of the achievements of women in sports,” said Destiny, reflecting on how Shields was not met with deference for her historic Olympics success until she was first profiled in the 2015 documentary “T-Rex: Her Fight for Gold,” prior to her second gold medal at the 2016 Olympics in Rio De Janeiro. “It’s just crazy because everything’s so much about timing. So it just is so unfortunate that that was something that happened during that time, because I don’t think it was on people’s radar as much as it should have been.”

Plus, the time away resulted in Oscar nominee Brian Tyree Henry replacing Ice Cube as Shields’ trainer Jason Crutchfield. “He’s one of the reasons that it had to happen that way. He is such a vital part to this story and to creating what we did, and I don’t think I would’ve been able to do it without him,” said Destiny of her fellow Gotham Award-nominated co-star. “And he was so gracious with me and supportive of me, and we hit it off instantly. It wasn’t something that we needed to force or try to dig in and figure out, the actors’ things of how we could pull this together. It was just completely natural with me and him, and our relationship.”

Stars Ryan Destiny and Brian Tyree Henry in ‘The Fire Inside’.Sabrina Lantos / Amazon MGM Studios/Courtesy Everett Collection

The actress was especially impressed by how quickly Henry adapted to what the role required. “He was coming right off of the ‘Atlanta’ set,” she said. “He had a week tops to prep for it all, and get in just a boxing coach’s mindset, and learn the pad work and all that stuff. It was just insane to be thrown into that and get right into it. I want to be able to do that one day.”

In playing Shields, Destiny was most challenged by portraying a demeanor she was only learning to possess. “Being an athlete in general is so different from an artist for so many different reasons. They really move through life in a different way, in a way more confident way. That was something I was not used to at all,” said the actress. “Boxers in particular are very much like you can’t tell them anything. You can’t tell them they’re not the best. They are the best and that’s the end of the discussion.” She found personal growth through “being able to do something like that, where I could get into that mindset and make it as believable as possible, taking the little seed of confidence that I had and just amplifying it as much as I could, and really letting the fear go out of the window.”

That fear and anxiety she felt initially, over potential criticism and scrutiny over how her performance measured up to the real Shields, became motivation to go in even harder. Destiny said while playing the character she looked not at what made her different from Shields, but at the similarities that could serve as a bridge into the athlete’s life.

“I do understand growing up in an environment where you feel like you have the odds stacked against you as a Black woman, and in these fields that do feel like we get the short end of the stick a lot of the time,” said Destiny. “So little things like that I knew I could connect to, but just making sure I could be looked at as an athlete was something that was very, very new for me, and I knew I had to step into it in a different way.”

Claressa Shields, Ryan Destiny, and Rachel Morrison attend the Flint Community Screening of ‘The Fire Inside’.Scott Legato/Getty Images for The Fire Inside

Going forward, the actress finds a lot of use in channeling her industry experience into something that gets her “to that emotional point that I needed to be in” for a role. “I use that, honestly a lot, in the work that I’ve done, and will hopefully continue to do, is pull from that space because it does hurt a lot. It does hurt to have this realization that you can do your best and try your hardest and it’s still not good enough for someone, and it’s still not good enough for whatever industry you’re in. And it can be pretty heartbreaking,” said Destiny. “I’m trying to make sure, even with this moment that we’re having now, that I go in with the mindset of knowing that my time is my time, and knowing that as long as I’m proud of it, that is something that is an accomplishment in itself, and that is something that is a reward in itself as well.”

She has especially managed expectations around the film being one of many big Christmas Day releases, or being in the awards conversation, all things she learned how to do through the experience of nearly losing out on this opportunity. “If it’s all said and done, and this doesn’t get to the heights that we all want it to get to, that is still ok, and it’s still something that I’m proud of, and it still touched a lot of people, and it still changed someone’s life, and it’s still important,” Destiny said. “It’s about Claressa at the end of the day, and amplifying her story, and making sure people learn about it, and learn about her. And so it’s always just the lesson that we have to continuously learn, is how things don’t always happen how we see them happening, and how we want them in our minds.”

That is not to say she is taking this moment for granted, “This is the most proud I’ve ever been of a project, and that’s something I’d love to continue to feel,” said Destiny. “That is a reflection of the people behind it. Directors like Rachel, writers like Barry. Obviously I really lucked out with this, and that does not happen all the time that you have all these Academy Award-nominated people in the equation. But it does show in the work how much they care about it… Whatever project I do next, I want to feel really good about the outcome, no matter who sees it, who doesn’t see it, because that’s really what matters the most is just doing really great work. This definitely is a very new great beginning for me and I just want to continue to do stories like it, so we’ll see.”

The Fire Inside, an Amazon MGM Studios release, opens in theaters nationwide on December 25, 2024.