Requiem for a Heavyweight

Six years later, it was adapted into the 1962 feature film of the same name starring Anthony Quinn, Jackie Gleason, Mickey Rooney, and Julie Harris.

The broadcast was directed by Ralph Nelson and is generally considered one of the finest examples of live television drama in the United States, as well as being Serling's personal favorite of his own work.

Just before he is scheduled to go into the wrestling ring in a humiliating mountain man costume, McClintock learns Maish bet against him in his last match and parts ways with his manager and mentor.

Requiem for a Heavyweight was the beginning of what became one of the new medium's most successful creative teams, writer Rod Serling and director Ralph Nelson.

BBC Television in the United Kingdom screened a version of the play in their regular Sunday Night Theatre anthology strand on March 31, 1957.

Sean Connery, five years before portraying James Bond, starred as McClintock,[3] while Alvin Rakoff produced and, with Serling's approval, also wrote some new material to cover costume changes that took place during commercial breaks on US television, but could not do so on the non-commercial BBC.

In 1985, it was adapted into a short-lived Broadway version at the Martin Beck Theatre starring John Lithgow as Harlan and George Segal as Maish.