The Iron Claw began streaming on Max this past weekend, and it’s the perfect movie to watch if you want to feel really, really sad.
Written and directed by Sean Durkin (also known for 2011’s Martha Marcy May Marlene and 2020’s The Nest), The Iron Claw is a heartbreaking sports biopic that tells the unbelievably sad story of the Von Erich family. The Von Erichs were a family of professional wrestlers who grew to prominence in the ’70s and ’80s. They won several NWA World Heavyweight Championships, but are better known for the “Von Erich” curse, a myth that spread after five of the Von Erich sons died tragic deaths.
The Iron Claw posits that it was not a curse that killed the Von Erichs, but rather a history of mental health struggles exacerbated by the relentless patriarch of the family, Fritz Von Erich.
But The Iron Claw true story is even more tragic than what you see in the film. Read on to learn about Chris Von Erich, and why Chris Von Erich is not in The Iron Claw.
The Iron Claw is based on the true story of Kevin Von Erich (played by Efron), a professional wrestler and, at the age of 66, the last surviving son of wrestler Fritz Von Erich. Five of the elder Von Erich’s sons died tragically young, leading many to believe the family was cursed.
The true story of the Von Erich brothers is, if you can believe it, even more tragic than the story told in The Iron Claw. In the movie, Kevin has four brothers, including an older brother named Jack Jr. who died as a child. Slowly, all of his brothers die, because they are pushed to their physical and mental limits by their abusive, hard-to-please father, Jack “Fritz” Von Erich (played by Holt McCallany).
There’s David (played by actor Harris Dickinson), who dies of enteritis (an inflamed, or this case, burst, intestine) after an intense fight with the NWA World Heavyweight Champion. There’s Mike (Stanley Simons), the young black sheep who would rather play guitar than wrestle—but who is pressured into the ring after David’s death, and sustains a terrible injury that leaves him unable to make music. That, combined with brain damage, drives Mike to take his own life. Then there’s Kerry (Jeremy Allen Wright) who loses his right foot in a motorcycle accident, and deteriorates mentally. He, too, takes his own life. Kevin is left as the last Von Erich brother standing. A textual epilogue reveals he and his wife Pam (played by Lily James in the movie) have four children and 13 grandchildren, and live on a large ranch in Hawaii.
If you think that’s too tragic to be true, then it may shock to learn that in real life, Kevin Von Erich had a total of five brothers, not four, and all five of them died. The brother you don’t see in the movie, Chris Von Erich, was the youngest of the siblings, and he also died by suicide in 1991, at the age of 21. Though he tried to make it in wrestling like his brothers, he never achieved the same level of success or fame. Like his brothers Mike and Kerry, he struggled with drug addiction, and was reportedly found with cocaine and valium in his system when he died.
In a 2023 interview with The Los Angeles Times, director Sean Durkin explained that while Chris Von Erich was included in previous drafts, the real story was simply too tragic and too repetitive to make for a good Hollywood film. “It was one more tragedy that the film couldn’t really withstand.” Durkin said that Chris was a character in his film for at least “five years,” and that Durkin himself pushed back against notes to cut the fifth brother. But he ultimately relented.
“When you’re trying to get a film made, you have to separate it at some point and say, ‘These are characters on a page, and this is a film, and there’s no way you’re going to fully capture the life of a person in a film,’” Durkin said. “You have to make difficult choices to try and get to something truthful or representative or emotional that reflects the core of the journey you’re choosing to tell within this family.”
For a more extensive breakdown of how The Iron Claw movie veered from the true story, check out the LA Times article linked above.