Make sure to strap yourselves in when you tune in for Finding Tony. This cinematic journey you’re about to embark upon will get bumpy, and along the way, you will get emotionally yanked in directions you didn’t expect.
Finding Tony is a riveting and critically acclaimed story that has been marinating in director-writer Raven Magwood Goodson’s soul since she was 15 years old.
Fast-forward to today and Goodson’s enthralling film was screened at the NBA All-Star Game in Indianapolis this past February. The exclusive event was hosted by Los Angeles Lakers superstar Anthony Davis, one of the producers of Finding Tony, and viewed by members of 100 Black Men of America.
The jarring and uplifting film revolves around former basketball star Tony Greene, who was soaring upward toward legendary status.
But Greene, played by Stephen Bishop, experienced incomprehensible and unbearable pain when he discovered his wife was murdered in their home — along with the unborn child she was carrying.
Languishing in depression, rotting in self-pity and steadily drowning in alcohol, Greene’s life took a miraculous turn for the better when a good friend, Dr. Terrence Daniel (played by rap icon David Banner), implored Greene to coach the Lincoln Community College women’s basketball team.
There, Greene meets a talented yet equally troubled 17-year-old basketball phenom named Destiny. Her name is appropriate as the two tormented souls begin the process of revelation, epiphany and healing during their basketball team’s fight to turn around their moribund squad.