DirecTVThe world of Mixed Martial Arts fighting relies on pure athleticism, discipline and sportsmanship. But behind closed gym doors, the lives of the fighters who dedicate their lives, bank accounts and bodies are as messy as can be.
Or at least that's the story that DirecTV's new MMA drama Kingdom is telling. And even though the show is taking an authentic and raw look at the world of MMA fighting, you don't need to be a die-hard fan of the sport to become obsessed with Kingdom.
There's something for everyone, from the stacked (and super-buff) cast, to compelling character stories, to complicated family drama...and yes, there's some intense fighting and violence.
The gritty, dark series from creator Byron Balasco stars newly buff Nick Jonas, Friday Night Lights' Matt Lauria, Parenthood's Jonathan Tucker, Captain America: The Winter Soldier's Frank Grillo, The Glades' Kiele Sanchez and House of Cards' Joanna Going, and you've never seen any of these actors in roles like this before.
"That was one of the biggest things that attracted me to the show, the fact that it is so different and that I had to push myself pretty hard," Jonas told E! News on set. "I told myself I would do whatever it takes to get this part because the writing is so brilliant and the show itself has turned out to be something so special."
The singer plays champion fighter Nate Kulina, who's at the peak of his fighting career when Kingdom begins. "My favorite part about playing Nate is digging so deep that it makes me uncomfortable," Jonas said. "It's my job as a storyteller to push myself so far that I feel like I've gone too far. That's how I know I'm doing my best work. On this show, so many times when I'm on my way home I just sit in my car and I'm so shaken up still from what we just shot. It's so heavy that when I get home I need to put on a comedy and just laugh."
Jonas went through a very physical transformation to land the role and to authentically portray the choreographed but real fight scenes.
"When I first started training, the goal was to put on about 15-16 pounds of muscle which I did," Jonas said. "In the first episode I'm really huge. I wanted to be an animal. Nate is quiet and reserved but he has these spurts of showing the rage inside him and I needed the physicality to match that. It was a full time job training even before shooting started."
Lauria also plays a fighter, Ryan Wheeler, but one who's been out of the sport for four years due to a stint in jail. Still, he also had to go through extensive training before and during shooting to get into the right mindset and physical shape to play a "vicious" ex-MMA champ.
"It's been extremely physically demanding," Lauria said. "I'll condition in the morning, shoot for 12 hours or longer, then come home and lift at night. And then do it all again. But it's also emotionally and mentally demanding, so it's been the most challenging role I've ever played."
And even though the fight scenes are meticulously shot to look real, there won't be a fight in each episode, since the show is about more than just the sport.
"I don't think we've ever seen a world like this on television," Sanchez, who plays Ryan's ex and current girlfriend to Alvey Kulina (Grillo), said. "And while it's set in the world of MMA, it's not about MMA. It's about these characters who are so messy and are comfortable in being uncomfortable."
Tucker, who plays Alvey's other son Jay, promises that both fans and non-fans of MMA will enjoy Kingdom for the same reason.
"It's a behind the world look at what the fighting world really is," Tucker told us. "The athleticism, the commitment, the discipline. It's a way of life for these guys and they're not in it for the money because it's expensive and the purse you can win isn't that much. It's for the passion of the sport. Fighters will see their lives accurately portrayed onscreen for the first time while people who maybe don't know much about the sport will get to learn all about it."
And that's exactly why Balasco wrote the show. "I really wanted to write a show that was authentic to the live of the fighters. Their lives and experiences are not necessarily how MMA fighting is promoted," Balasco said. "I wanted to take away any preconceived notions about what a show about fighting would be and show that these are people and this is a character show and family drama on a certain level about extremely dark and complicated topics. So you don't have to be a fan of fighting to love the show, but if you are a fighter and a fan of the sport, you'll feel like we're doing justice and being authentic and true to the realities of the life of the sport."
Balasco isn't exaggerating when he says the show is dark. Not by a long shot.
"We don't have to hold anything back because we're on DirecTV," he said. "There's no content restrictions, and there's nothing that we have to soften. We can really lean into the passion of the world and we try to do the fight sequences as real as possible. There's a lot of darkness, but there's also a lot of heart."
That heart comes from the family at the center of Kingdom, the Kulinas, with Alvey at the head of it all.
"Alvey's an ex-fighter, an ex-drug addict, an ex-drunk and an ex-husband," Grillo said. "He's an OK dad and he owns the gym, so he's got the gym family and his blood family. He's trying to survive and stay relevant. Fighting is a metaphor for everything in this guy's life. The thing about MMA, at my age I would have just missed the UFC. I would have been too old by the time the UFC was established. I think there is a part of him that feels gipped that he was born too late and that's part of the driving force of this guy, to be relevant and stay relevant in this world despite his age."
Alvey has extremely complicated relationships with his two sons Nate and Jay, who are both fighters.
"My character Nate is a very intense fighter," Jonas said. "He's a good kid, but there's definitely a darkness to him and we'll see that later on this season. He has a very tough backstory that's led him to bottling up all his emotions and that's why he lets out so much in so little in these rare, animalistic explosions. His world is going to be flipped on his head in the first episode, and then he's going to be forced to rely on his real family outside of his gym family. He's going to get to a very dark place."
While Nate is training at the gym for a fight in the premiere, Jay is estranged from both the life of fighting and his father.
"Jay is this high-wire tight rope act," Tucker said. "He was able to find his balance with the discipline of the gym. For lots of reasons like ego, father issues, substance abuse issues, he's no longer a part of the gym when the show starts and he replaces that sense of addiction to the gym with other addictions and other demons. His life is unbalanced and he's going to be struggling with finding that balance again. Like any addict, his path to recovery is a rocky one."
Lauria's ex-con Ryan used to be like a son to Alvey as well, before he landed in jail for reasons that will be revealed.
"On paper, he had a pretty good upbringing, but he's a guy who gets 'Destroyer' tattooed across his chest," Lauria said with a laugh. "He's had a tricky relationship with his authoritarian father since a young age. But he makes one huge, insurmountable f--k-up that takes him down and takes him down hard. I go from being this peak, top collegiate athlete to professional MMA fighter and champion who has the world for the taking, but because of drugs and alcohol and women, I make all the wrong choices and land in jail for four years. I go to such a low point and now I'm trying to rebuild my life. There's a certain viciousness to my character that somehow pervades and leaks in to all his other, otherwise generally good features."
And there's another reason Ryan's relationship with Alvey is now strained: Alvey is dating Ryan's ex, Lisa.
"My coach who was like a father to me is now dating my ex!" Lauria revealed. "This is a woman who I loved dearly, but just ruined by putting her through such a traumatic heartbreak and experience the event that landed me in jail. I want to show her I'm a new man now, but as time goes on, he's going to realize he's not satisfied with just that."
Yup, there is a love triangle on Kingdom. But this is a very adult look at how relationships can get complicated as life goes on.
"When we first find Lisa, everything's in its right place and then in the pilot, it's the day that her world gets turned upside down when Ryan gets out of jail," Sanchez said. "The past comes back and that past is riddled with really complicated emotions and conflicting emotions. The love triangle in this is not easy or convenient. It's really, really messy and there's no clear choice for her. Both of them have pieces of her heart and it's a constant battle with herself to decide what she's going to let herself feel. I know how she truly feels and what she feels and what she's portraying are two very different things."
Rounding out the cast is Going, who plays Alvey's ex-wife and mother to Nate and Jay, Christina Kulina.
"Christina and Alvey were married quite young and she has struggled with emotional issues and that led her to self-medication," Going said. "When we meet her she is an addict and a prostitute, and her journey is going to be extremely rocky this season. She has a deep connection with one of her sons that's going to drive her."