Margot Robbie’s R-Rated Expose Will Permanently Change Your View Of Reality

By TeeJay Small
| Published 12 seconds ago

Born in the late 1990s, I’ve spent my entire life hearing the name “Tonya Harding” used as a punchline. I never had much awareness of who she was, but based on some old Simpsons jokes and a few misplaced rap lyrics, I always thought she was a skater who busted her opponent’s kneecaps on the ice in a fit of passion, right in front of a packed crowd. That is, until last week, when I finally sat down to watch Craig Gillespie’s 2017 biopic I, Tonya.

For the uninitiated, I, Tonya tells the true story of Tonya Harding (Margot Robbie), with a little bit of creative license for story purposes. The film takes the viewer from Tonya’s years as a child figure skating prodigy, through her relationship with her abusive mother (Allison Janney) and later her abusive boyfriend (Sebastian Stan), and eventually to her Olympic skating dreams. Through it all, we see how Tonya was mistreated by those closest to her and by the Olympic committee, which viewed her as too unmarketable to home audiences.

Over several years, the budding athlete is forced to change everything about herself to get ahead. She marries her abusive boyfriend just so she can present a more family-forward image, she changes her accent so she won’t be perceived as ‘white trash’, and she adjusts her management team to be as cutthroat and unforgiving as possible.

Tonya even managed to become the first female figure skater to complete two triple Axel jumps in a competition. I don’t know much about skating, but it looked pretty impressive in the movie, as I watched from the comfort of my couch, covered in popcorn kernels.

Once she qualifies for the 1994 Olympics, the narrative kicks into slightly familiar territory. We learn that Tonya, along with many of her peers, routinely receives death threats before going out on the ice. When her husband, Jeff, suspects that the threats are coming from Tonya’s friend, Nancy Kerrigan, he suggests sending a few threats of their own, just to rattle her performance. Jeff outsources the job to his eccentric buddy Shawn (Paul Walter Hauser), who outsources it to someone else, and by the time this game of telephone reaches Nancy, the job ceases to be a threat and becomes a violent attack.

If you believe Tonya Harding’s account of the events (and thus the movie’s telling of how it all went down), she had no idea any of this was happening. The way she relays it, Tonya thought someone was dropping a letter in Nancy’s mailbox. Instead, Nancy was beaten with a baton, leaving her unable to compete in a national competition, which, ironically, fast-tracked her to the Olympic team.

Kerrigan ultimately took home the silver medal for her performance at the 1994 Olympics, while an emotionally rattled Tonya placed eighth. Upon returning home, Harding is barred from competing in any competitive figure skating event for the rest of her life.

Since she has structured her entire existence around the sport, Tonya sees this as a death sentence and begs for jail time, to no avail. Truthfully, I had no idea that an organization could even make a ruling like that in the first place.

Before I watched I, Tonya, I had only ever heard this woman’s name alongside those of O.J. Simpson, Aaron Hernandez, and Oscar Pistorius. It goes to show just how strong the media narrative was at the time that she could be banned from her livelihood and turned into a punchline for decades to come.

The film does an impeccable job of humanizing Tonya and making her more sympathetic, as long as you believe her account of what happened. Even if you don’t believe her, it’s still a hell of a story, and one I’m glad I finally got around to checking out.

If you’re interested in watching I, Tonya, the film is currently streaming for free on Tubi.