Boxer Christy Martin faced violence in and out of the ring — now a new biopic tells her story

In the 1990s, Christy Martin was considered the most exciting and successful female boxer. She won a super welterweight title, was the first woman signed by boxing impresario Don King, and was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. But Martin also endured decades of violence outside the boxing ring.

Now, her story is the basis of the film Christy, starring actress Sydney Sweeney.

We meet the real-life Christy Salters Martin at Oscar De La Hoya’s Golden Boy gym in downtown LA. She slips on a pair of boxing gloves to punch a speed bag for a photo shoot. After recording a TikTok message for her fans, she sits down for an interview wearing a button-down shirt in her signature pink.

Martin’s constant companion, a tiny Pomeranian named Champ, is nestled on her lap, sucking her finger. “He’s a baby,” she explains. “It keeps both of us calm.”

Life is much more peaceful these days for Martin, now 57. She says it’s been a blast watching Sweeney – “Hollywood’s it girl” – mimic her famous boxing ring antics, including sticking her tongue out at opponents.

“My style was definitely ‘seek and destroy,’ like Mike Tyson and Joe Frazier,” Martin says, reminiscing about her boxing career. “Knocking somebody out and trash-talking. It was fun.”

Martin says she grew up in West Virginia playing Little League Baseball and basketball on boys’ teams— there were no girls teams yet. As a college student on a basketball scholarship, she suggested to a local promoter that women should also fight in the amateur tough-man contests.

“You know, it’s when you’re young and you’re crazy, I thought it would be fun. I had no idea what I was doing, but neither did anyone else,” she chuckles. “I was an athlete, they were just barroom brawlers, just tough women. You know, I probably wouldn’t want to run into them on the street, but in a ring where there’s rules, it was ok.”

At 22, she married her trainer and manager, Jim Martin, who was 25 years older. Barely 5-foot-5, she punched above her weight and kept winning fights. That’s when promoter Don King came calling.

“Here I am, the coal miner’s daughter from this little bitty town in southern West Virginia,” she says. “I’m sitting across the table from Don King, and, wow, feeling out of place. But he gave me a wonderful opportunity.”

Martin says inside the boxing ring she felt safe, but her private life was a different story. For two decades, she suffered her husband’s emotional and physical brutality.

“People probably thought I was on top of the world; I was fighting on the biggest cards, fighting in Las Vegas, fighting in Madison Square Garden, on the cover of Sports Illustrated. I was doing a lot of cool things,” she says, “but at home I was being reminded, ‘if ever you leave me, I’ll kill you.'”

The film Christy depicts how Jim Martin tried to make good on two decades of threats, and how Martin survived being stabbed and shot by him in 2010.

Australian director David Michôd wrote the script with his partner Mirrah Foulkes, who spent time getting to know Christy Martin and her story.

“She’s pugnacious. She’s got a lip, and I really liked the idea of making a film about a trash-talking, colorful woman,” Michôd says. “But more importantly, I was drawn to the idea of exploring how these kinds of coercive control relationships work. Like, how is it that a woman as tough as Christy can be trapped in a relationship like this for 20 years?”

In her 2022 memoir Fighting For Survival, Martin wrote about enduring sexual abuse as a child and domestic abuse as an adult, and having to hide her sexuality. She now runs Christy’s Champs, a nonprofit for survivors of domestic abuse. As a motivational speaker, she visits prisons, schools and other places, encouraging others to leave abusive situations.

“When you talk to somebody about the struggle, when you talk about the escape, you start to feel like you can do it,” she says.

Martin says her ex-husband died in prison last year. In 2017, she married her former rival, Lisa Holewyne.

Lately, she’s been hanging out at promotional events and even the World Series, with the actress who portrays her.

“Christy is a trailblazer, she’s the ultimate underdog, an incredible role model,” says Sweeney, whose production company Fifty-Fifty Films produced the film.

Having grown up kickboxing and grappling, Sweeney says she trained for two-and-a-half months in a boxing gym she had built in her grandmother’s shed. She also bulked up 35 pounds by pounding protein shakes.

“I was surprised every day by the different battles that Christy fought within the ring and outside the ring, but not allowing all the pain to define who she is,” Sweeney tells NPR. “This woman has gone through so much, and she can open up so many doors for others and honestly save lives. And I wanted to be a part of championing that. She’s full of life and she’s funny, and she’s such a good friend. It’s really incredible to see.”