Plot summary

1970. World No. 1 tennis player Billie Jean King, long having fought for gender equality in the game, is irked to learn that the United States Lawn Tennis Association (USLTA), which organizes professional tennis tournaments in the country, has, at their next tournament, a prize package eight times larger for the men's champion than the women's champion. King's primary beef is with former professional tennis player Jack Kramer, the face of the USLTA's stance on why men deserve more money. King and women's tennis advocate Gladys Heldman vow to fight this inequality by the USLTA by breaking with the USLTA and forming their own women's association, the threat an initially empty one in that they have no plan to back it up. They, calling the new organization the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) initially with nine players including King, are quickly able to secure stable sponsorship for a women's tennis tour with more prize money than that was offered by the USLTA. Meanwhile, fifty-five year old former professional tennis player Bobby Riggs, bored with his life working for his wealthy wife Priscilla Riggs' father and craving the excitement of the limelight and of his favorite pastimes of gambling and hustling, comes up with the idea to challenge King to an exhibition tennis match for that much desired "equal" prize money, he in the process portraying himself as the male chauvinist pig, the humor in the concept not lost on Priscilla, off of whose money he had long been living. This situation is set against the pressure on King, who is not only battling to stay on top especially against Australian Margaret Court, a female tennis personality the antithesis of King, but also her personal struggles as she, faithfully married to supportive Larry King in he understanding he coming second in her life to tennis, embarks on her first same-sex relationship with hairdresser Marilyn Barnett, which, if becoming public, could threaten the existence of the WTA. While realizing the outcome of her match with Riggs holds much significance, King also understands that Riggs' purpose is not to demonstrate male dominance per se as it is for Kramer.—Huggo