In a life of encounters with celebrities, comedians and crooks, Craig Glazer has met all sorts.</p><p>The one who sticks with him the most is Muhammad Ali. But Glazer wasn&rsquo;t always a fan.</p><p>&ldquo;When he first became famous I was a kid and a fan of Sonny Liston,&rdquo; Glazer, owner of Stanford&rsquo;s Comedy Club, said.</p><p>&ldquo;I hated Cassius Clay. I thought, &lsquo;Who is this loudmouth? I hope he gets the crud beat out of him.&rsquo;&ensp;&rdquo;</p><p>More than 45 years have passed, and Glazer now believes that that &ldquo;loudmouth&rdquo; may be the most influential pop culture figure of the late 20th century. Of course the former Cassius Clay, who suffers from Parkinson&rsquo;s disease, keeps a low profile, rarely making public appearances and never giving interviews.</p><p>In fact, the last in-depth series of interviews Ali gave were conducted by Glazer as part of the 1991 boxing documentary &ldquo;Champions Forever.&rdquo; This month &ldquo;Champions&rdquo; was re-released on DVD in &ldquo;The Definitive Edition,&rdquo; this time with scads of Ali material not used in the original production. </p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m claiming, though I couldn&rsquo;t prove it, that this was Ali&rsquo;s last interview. Or at least his last meaningful interview,&rdquo; Glazer said. &ldquo;I think it&rsquo;s an important part of history.&rdquo;</p><p>The never-before-seen footage finds Ali in a playful mood, joking with Glazer and the film crew, mock sparring and giving blow-by-blow recaps of his greatest fights.</p><p>The former champ talks about the meaning of his life, death and how he wants to be remembered.</p><p>How Glazer became part of the Ali saga is a story in itself. He&rsquo;d just gotten out of prison, the culmination of a decade-long scam in which Glazer and a partner posed as drug agents and set up fake busts, seizing money from big-time dealers and keeping it for themselves. He and pal Don Woodbeck got so good at it that they were hired by the authorities to be <em>real</em> narcs. (Those events are recounted in Glazer&rsquo;s 2008 book &ldquo;The King of Sting,&rdquo; now in development as a feature film.)</p><p>The newly freed Glazer had just moved into a halfway house for ex-cons when he was contacted by a former inmate making a boxing documentary.</p><p>&ldquo;The producers were looking for help because they knew nothing about boxing,&rdquo; Glazer said. &ldquo;They didn&rsquo;t know which fight was which, but I was a huge fan. So I&rsquo;m two days in a halfway house in L.A. and a Rolls-Royce pulls up, and the next thing I know I&rsquo;m on the lot at MGM with Ali and George Foreman.&rdquo;</p><p>Cut to a year later at the film&rsquo;s premiere party at Century City in Los Angeles. The big-name sportscaster who was to interview the movie&rsquo;s stars &mdash; Ali, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, Ken Norton and Larry Holmes &mdash; was late showing up.</p><p>&ldquo;All these celebrity athletes are standing there with nothing to do,&rdquo; Glazer said. &ldquo;I said, &lsquo;Hey, I&rsquo;m a movie producer now.&rsquo; So I jumped the rope, they turned on the camera and I started asking questions.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;Champions Forever&rdquo; was a huge success, with a solid theatrical run. For a time it was the world&rsquo;s best-selling sports video.</p><p> Glazer&rsquo;s credit as a producer on the film led to a brief career making sports documentaries.</p><p> &ldquo;Suddenly Hollywood figured I knew how to do sports movies.&rdquo;</p><p>He cranked out a sequel &mdash; &ldquo;Champions Forever: The Latin Legends&rdquo; &mdash; and a movie about racecar drivers.