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Riggs and King were clown and queen. It was great entertainment that this docudrama gets about perfectly right.
Every so often an exceptionally capable woman has to prove her worth by competing against a clown. That’s one of the durable truisms of “Battle of the Sexes,” a glib, enjoyable fictionalization of the 1973 exhibition tennis match between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs. She was 29 and one of the top female tennis players in the world. He was 55 and had been a world champion before she was born. She was a feminist symbol and the first female athlete to win more than $100,000 in a single year; he was a self-avowed male chauvinist pig who liked to gamble big. It was a man vs. woman match made for maximum public-relations gimmickry but also a deadly serious referendum on equality on and off the court.
Besides, it’s an entertaining docudrama. Emma Stone as King certifies herself as an actress of considerable range after her Oscar for the romantic La La Land. Steve Carell as Riggs is playful and cunning just like Riggs, who underestimated King’s skill and savvy.