Some stories are so unlikely they sound like tall tales, and then Michael Chiklis shows up to make them feel biblical. In The Senior, the Shield and Fantastic Four star plays real-life Texan Mike Flynt, who at age 59 really did strap on the pads and re-join his college football team four decades after walking away. “I asked him the first day, ‘Mike, are you crazy?’” Chiklis laughs. “He’s not. Just driven.”
Flynt, sitting beside him, nods. “I wasn’t chasing glory. I was finishing something I’d left undone. That kind of thing can haunt you.”
That ghost of unfinished business runs through every yard of the movie. “We all have regrets,” Chiklis says. “Things we wish we could fix. What Mike did—most of us only dream about doing.” He cites one small but devastating scene in which Flynt reconnects with a man he once hurt on the field. “They forgive each other. I’ve lived that,” Chiklis admits. “You torture yourself for years over something someone else has already let go. It’s about forgiving yourself, too.”
Flynt’s story could have stayed a feel-good ESPN segment. Instead, under director Rod Lurie, it becomes something bigger—a film about masculinity, redemption, and what it really means to age out of your own myth. “There’s a tenderness here you don’t see in most football movies,” Chiklis says. “That relationship between Mike and his coach—it’s complicated, respectful, vulnerable. You don’t often get that from two men in a locker room.”
Flynt chuckles at the memory. “I was eight years older than my coach,” he says. “He took a risk on me. I’ll always be grateful he gave me that chance.”
Chiklis had to earn his own chance physically. “I was 59 when we shot this,” he says. “You can’t fake that. You don’t do one take—you do twenty. Twelve-hour days, Texas heat. I’d go home thinking, ‘Something’s going to snap.’ The next morning was worse because everything stiffened. But it was worth it. One of the most gratifying experiences of my career.”
Part of that joy came from Mary Stuart Masterson, who plays Flynt’s wife. “You don’t need an adjective,” Chiklis grins. “Just: Mary Stuart Masterson.”
It’s also the rare sports film where the team’s bonding moment involves The Spinners. The scene where Chiklis leads a locker-room dance to “Rubberband Man” wasn’t based on reality, but it worked. “That was the day we became a team,” he says. “They were all these young guys, first movie, maybe a little intimidated. I opened myself up to be the old guy they could tease. Once they saw that, we were good.”
Flynt laughs. “He’s got moves, man.”
Chiklis has played plenty of real people—Curly Howard, John Belushi, Red Auerbach—but this time the subject was watching from the sidelines. Literally. “Mike and his wife were on set every day,” he says. “At first I thought, ‘They’re staying?’ But they weren’t intrusive. They were fascinated by the process. And I could check details with them—this isn’t based on a true story. It is a true story.”
As for Flynt, seeing his own life replayed was surreal. “There were other actors considered,” he admits, “but most said, ‘No way I’m putting on pads at that age.’ Michael could. He was the guy.”
The film’s emotional spine is a locker-room speech near the end—one Chiklis dreaded for all the right reasons. “The big motivational speech is such a cliché,” he says. “Rod Lurie saved it for the second-to-last day, after we’d lived through everything together. At that point those boys really were my teammates. I didn’t have to act. It just happened.”
That unforced honesty defines both the movie and the man it celebrates. “You have to tap into your own life,” Chiklis says. “Acting’s about empathy—walking a mile in someone else’s shoes. Over time it humbles you.” He pauses, turning philosopher. “Socrates said, ‘The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.’ The more you live, the truer that gets. You realize how small you are in the grand scheme—and how grateful you should be for the time you get.”
It’s an unexpectedly poetic note for a football film, but then The Senior isn’t about winning games. It’s about showing up again when the world assumes you’re finished. “It’s a redemption story,” Chiklis says. “But not the Hollywood kind. The real kind—where you still hurt, but you keep going.”
And if you’re lucky, maybe you even get a good block in.
Watch the full interview above and then check out the trailer below.
