Billy and the Kids

Keep your hands up, tuck yourself in and you weather the storm without turning your back.

– Boxing mentor Billy Graham coaches a young boxer

What goes in your head stay in your head, a man is what he thinks he is, a little boy is the same, you've got to start thinking good things.

– Boxing mentor Billy Graham on building a healthy self-image

There are amazing stories with each and every kid that goes to the gym. This documentary has featured just seven of them, but the Naenae gym has 170 kids on the waiting list.

– Director Mark Albiston

For every story that Billy had about a boxing hero, he’d match it with a kid that had come through his gym—passing exams, becoming a musician, or owning their own lawn mowing business. He’d then shake his head and fight the tears as he told me about some of the kids that he’d lost, to abusive parents, drugs, gangs— you name it, he’s seen it.

– Director Mark Albiston on Billy Graham, Flicks website, 9 July 2019

I was eight-years-old and no one had ever really liked me before. But Dick Dunn the boxing coach did. He believed I could make it.

– Billy Graham remembers his first taste of the ring