"The Simone Biles Story: Courage to Soar" premiered on lifetime Saturday, February 3. The movie is based on her 2016 book, "Courage to Soar: A Body in Motion, A Life in Balance." Viewers were able to learn more from the special “Biography Presents: Simone Biles: American Gold” that immediately followed the movie.

Simone shared more information about her life and what she had to give up to follow her dream though it meant missing high school football games, the prom, and starting college at UCLA. Her longtime coach, Aimee Boorman, shared some interesting stories and explained why she will not be her coach as Simone trains for competition in the 2020 Olympics an event to which Simone says she is looking forward more than the 2016 Olympics.

About the movie

Simone Biles is the executive producer of the movie along with three others including her agent and Debbie Allen. The movie chronicled her life from the time she was three years old and in foster care through her great wins in Rio de Janeiro in 2016. That sealed her title as one of the greatest gymnasts of all time after winning a total of 19 Olympic and World Championship medals.

The opening scenes showed Simone and her siblings in foster care. She and her sister Adria were legally adopted by her grandfather, Ron Biles, and his second wife, Nellie. Her brother and another sister were adopted by her grandfather's sister since their mother was unable to care for the four children because of drug and alcohol addiction.

The cast

The entire cast was superb. Young Simone was played by the talented 8-year-old Canadian actress Nakai Takawira who looked like Simone who had the same mannerisms when she was that age. The teenage Simone was played by Jeanté Godlock who nailed the gymnastic performances, easily, since she has had 10 years of acrobatic gymnastics and dance training.

She also has tumbling experience that helped her perfect the role of Simone. The only thing that was quite obvious was that Godlock is actually three inches taller than 4-foot-8 Biles.

Biles’ parents, Ron and Nellie, are played by Julius Tennon, who is married to Viola Davis, and Tisha Campbell-Martin of television comedies "Martin" and “My Wife and Kids.”

What's next?

Biles returned to full-time gymnastics training last November.

She plans on competing next summer for the first time since the Olympics. At the end of the movie, she wrote "2020" in her journal as her next big dream.

On Saturday, before Biles' movie aired, Lifetime showed the re-run of "The Gabby Douglas Story" that premiered in 2014 after her 2012 Olympic all-around title.
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