Black history meets pure pomp in Peacock’s latest miniseries, “Fight Night: The Million Dollar Heist,” inspired by a podcast and based on a true story.

Peacock is owned by NBCUniversal, the parent company of TODAY.

The eight-part series is set at an after-party following Muhammad Ali’s return to the boxing ring in 1970, where Atlanta’s elite mingled with members of the criminal underworld. The all-star cast includes Don Cheadle, Kevin Hart, Taraji P. Henson, Samuel L. Jackson, Halle Bailey, Lori Harvey and more.

Speaking to TODAY.com, creator Shaye Ogbonna calls the series a love letter to Atlanta, where he comes from.

“It was of the utmost importance because I am a product of it,” says Ogbonna. “When you take on something personal that has to do with your origins, and especially when you want to say, ‘This is the story of how it came about,’ it’s a huge responsibility. But for me, it was a responsibility that I absolutely accepted.”

Read on to find out the real story.

What is “Fight Night” about?

The scene begins with Atlanta’s most famous bookie, Gordon “Chicken Man” Williams (Kevin Hart), who dreams of rising up the black mafia and becoming part of the nationwide black crime syndicate.

He believes that Muhammad Ali’s much-publicized comeback fight would be the perfect opportunity for this.

With the help of his part-time partner and part-time lover Vivian Thomas (Taraji P. Henson) and his accomplice Silky Brown (Atkins Estimond), he converts his basement into a makeshift Las Vegas casino in preparation for the biggest house party ever in A-Town.

Then the party becomes the target of a robbery – one that Williams didn’t plan, even though he’s a criminal himself. The robbers lock the partygoers in the basement and let the night continue upstairs to lure more people.

Who is behind the robbery? What happens next? The series answers all these questions as Don Cheadle’s detective JD Hudson launches an investigation.

How much of “Fight Night” is based on a true story?

“The plot and the events – a lot of it is true,” says creator Ogbonna. Where the series took liberties was “from the perspective of the characters.”

“I wanted a World“It helped me focus on four central elements: the fight, the robbery, the Atlanta of the story and the two main characters, Chicken Man and JD Hudson, who have to come together and sort things out,” he says.

Ali’s fight against Jerry Quarry took place on October 26, 1970, and drew crowds and celebrities. The fight was highly anticipated—not only was it Ali’s first in three years, but the heavyweight division Ali was returning to was “the best it’s ever been,” boxing historian Bert Sugar told Atlanta Magazine.

Ali, meanwhile, had been overshadowed by controversy over his opposition to U.S. intervention in Vietnam. He was drafted in 1966 but refused to serve on religious grounds. He was stripped of his boxing title, found guilty of conscientious objection and sentenced to five years in prison, NBC News reported.

The Supreme Court finally overturned the ruling in 1971, but not before Ali spent years lecturing and campaigning on his own behalf, becoming a symbol of the anti-Vietnam movement.

The state of Georgia has since granted him a license to box and the fight took place at a controversial moment in the state’s history.

“This is a turning point in Atlanta’s history, right after the civil rights movement, when many cities in the South were trying to figure out who they were, and Atlanta had a concrete plan,” Ogbonna says.

However, the robbery occurred after the fight, during a party at the home of Gordon “Chicken Man” Williams. The party was a “big deal,” the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported, with “engraved invitations” for people from as far away as New York.

The guests experienced an unpleasant surprise.

“Police said the partygoers were met by the robbers upon their arrival, forced into a basement and forced to strip and hand over their money and jewelry,” the New York Times reported at the time.

JD Hudson, Atlanta’s first black detective lieutenant, was assigned to the case, and although Williams was initially his prime suspect, he was ultimately not convicted.

Jeff Keating, producer of the “Fight Night” podcast, said there are still unanswered questions.

“The robbery is still so mysterious that we will probably never know the real story,” he told Atlanta Magazine.

Who was behind the robbery?

In November 1970, a grand jury in Georgia indicted three men on six counts of armed robbery each: McKinley Rogers, James Henry Hall, and Houston J. Hammond. Only Hammond was in police custody.

Six months later, Rogers and Hall were killed in the Bronx, the New York Times reported at the time.

Irvin J. Goldsmith, assistant district attorney in the Bronx, told the newspaper that it seemed as if the two had “received their own justice.”

Hudson was quoted by the New York Times as saying, “We said last fall it was just a question of who got them first – the police or the victims. It seems the victims got there first.”

Ogbonna tells TODAY.com that the series makes the robbers more three-dimensional characters than the headlines ever did.

“It was important to me that we delve into their stories and get information about who they are, to give them a human side. That was definitely an area where we took some creative liberties,” he says.

What happened to Williams and Hudson?

Atlanta-based magazine Creative Loafing profiled Williams and Hudson to talk about the events of 1970 and their lives since then.

Despite rumors that he had died, Williams was alive and well. After serving a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence in the 1970s, he left organized crime and became a pastor at a church in Atlanta. He also had six children. Williams died in 2014, according to an online obituary.

According to an online obituary, Hudson retired from the police force in 1990 and died in 2009.