Billie Jean King and her former husband, Larry King, have recalled the most painful moment of their marriage, the day he learned she was gay, just hours before the story became public.
Their reflections come decades later in a new documentary that examines how love, ambition and confusion collided under an unforgiving spotlight.
The film, Give Me the Ball!, premiered on January 27 at the Sundance Film Festival and revisits the events of 1981, when King was publicly outed after Los Angeles hairdresser Marilyn Barnett sued her for palimony.
Larry King says he had no idea about the relationship until the day before it became headline news.
“I didn’t know that this was going on,” Larry says in the documentary. “Billie Jean never mentioned it to me until the day before it hit the press.”
At the time, the couple described their marriage as open, a structure they believed allowed them to navigate the demands of King‘s career.
Still, the sudden exposure left Larry blindsided. King explained that she herself had not fully understood her sexuality during much of their relationship.
“I didn’t have much experience with sex at all or anything. One girl kissed me in college. That was it,” she said.
“Everybody thinks I was hanging with girls. I wasn’t at all. We had a great time, fell in love. I thought he was the one…. Larry was different from other guys. He was a feminist.”
The two met while attending California State University and married in 1965, long before King became a global symbol of change in women’s sports.
When love and purpose stopped moving in the same direction
As King‘s influence grew, so did the distance between the life she was building and the one Larry envisioned. He describes supporting her work while slowly realising it came at a personal cost.
“Billie Jean changed women’s tennis. And she wanted to change the world,” he noted. “I tried to fit into that plan, but it was more the life that Billie Jean wanted. It wasn’t the life I wanted.”
King acknowledged that disconnect, particularly around expectations of family life.
“He wanted us to have children and everything, but I started to realize something isn’t right,” she added.
The early 1970s were especially difficult. After King had an abortion, a private experience that later became public after Larry spoke about it, the marriage deteriorated further.
“I wasn’t gonna tell anybody,” King claimed, describing that period as “really bad.”
Conversations about divorce followed, though Larry says he struggled to accept them.
“I thought when we got married forever, it was forever,” he added. “I considered the divorce stuff to be more nonsense than reality.”
King now reflects on that time with clarity shaped by distance.
“It wasn’t right for Larry and I to stay married,” she said. “I didn’t know what I was doing. I hadn’t figured out who I was, and he shouldn’t have been suffering through that either.
“I kept pleading with him to divorce me, and he wouldn’t do it. It was all about me; it wasn’t about him. I was the one having challenges. I was so confused.”
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