LeBron James practices his Emmy acceptance speech on the ESPYs. (Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
LeBron James has provided NBA followers with loads of memorable televised moments over the course of a ten-12 months NBA profession that is featured four NBA Most Valuable Player awards and again-to-again NBA championships. Now, he’ll try to take his penchant for creating should-see TELEVISION into the realm of scripted entertainment, joining childhood good friend/enterprise companion Maverick Carter and TV producer/Fenway Sports activities Group chairman Tom Werner in growing a half-hour comedy program for the cable community Starz.
The show, titled “Survivor’s Regret,” will follow two pals who discover success — one within the NBA, one in the business world — and “discover the complexity, comedy and drama of an experience that everyone reads about, but few understand — what truly happens when you make it out,” in keeping with the network press launch asserting the challenge:
Through a mixture of God-given expertise and north Philly grit, Cam Calloway and Reggie Vaughn have achieved fame and fortune that neither may have imagined growing up in one of many toughest neighborhoods in Philadelphia. However success comes with its personal challenges, and the cousins and confidantes wrestle with the rewards of money, stardom, love, and sometimes, the guilt of having “made it.”
“We’re incredibly excited at Starz to work with such a deep bench of gifted storytellers to develop ‘Survivor’s Remorse,’” mentioned [Starz Chief Government Officer Chris] Albrecht. “Everyone involved brings something unique to the desk — from Tom Werner’s legendary tv success to LeBron’s extraordinary life experiences and viewpoint. We hope that ‘Survivor’s Regret’ will carry the humor, ache and complexity of these characters to life in a approach that’s honest and compelling for audiences worldwide.”
Here’s a fun piece of news for my fellow ’80s babies and ’90s children: Mike O’Malley has been named one of many show’s government producers and writers. I’m sure he acquired the gig for his sitcom expertise (he was the lead on “Sure, Expensive” and has played a supporting position on “Glee”) and writing/producing work on Showtime’s “Shameless,” but I am going to select to believe it was due, a minimum of partly, to James being a big fan of Nickelodeon’s “Guts” rising up.
We’re still a great distance away from the present ever seeing airwaves — as Dave Itzkoff of the New York Occasions, amongst others, has famous, the network has yet to actually place an episode order and begin production on the show, so this could very well turn into one of many numerous projects that get killed before they even really get started. It might have a fighting chance, though, given Starz’s determined want for unique programming that may make subscribers tune in, James’ megawatt star energy and Werner’s TV bona fides — he co-based The Carsey-Werner Firm, which produced a wide range of profitable and lengthy-operating sitcoms, together with “The Cosby Present,” “Roseanne,” “A Totally different World,” “Grace Below Fire,” “3rd Rock from the Solar” and “That ’70s Show.” Werner was additionally an executive producer on “The Life and Times of Tim,” an animated HBO comedy with a very different tone from those more mainstream network hits.
While the thumbnail sketch of a show about two pals who achieve fame and wealth in basketball and business will obviously draw inspiration from the tales of executive producers James and Carter, Maverick advised The Related Press that it is “definitely not an autobiographical collection about my life or LeBron’s life; it’s fictional characters residing in a fictional world.” He additionally made clear that James would not be stepping in front of the digicam on “Survivor’s Remorse,” for worry of derailing things: “LeBron is definitely too famous, he would screw the show up if I tried to make a show about him.”
James, nonetheless, did not shrink back from the parallels between their come-up and the characters’ inspirations: “For Maverick and I even to be the place we are right now, given the place we came from, is kind of onerous to consider. I felt prefer it was a narrative that wanted to be advised, and nobody can craft a narrative like Tom Werner.”
The title, “Survivor’s Regret,” seems a bit darkish for a half-hour comedy, nevertheless it’s additionally clearly something that is been on LeBron’s thoughts — and part of LeBron’s branding — in latest months. After his Miami Warmth defeated the San Antonio Spurs to seize a second consecutive league championship and NBA Finals MVP trophy, James made a degree of emphasizing the statistically unlikely nature of his ascent: “I’m LeBron James from Akron, Ohio, from the inner city. I am not even supposed to be here. That is enough. Each evening I stroll into the locker room, I see a number 6 [jersey] with ‘James’ on the again. I’m blessed. So what everybody’s saying about me off the court docket don’t matter. I ain’t received no worries.”
James expanded on that in an interview with the AP:
“I believe the main factor for me is, to begin with, making it out of a spot where you are not alleged to. You’re supposed to be a statistic and find yourself like the rest of the individuals within the internal city — (and) being one of the few to make it out and everyone taking a look at you to be the savior.” [...]
“Once you make it out, everybody expects for — they automatically assume that they made it out and it’s extremely robust for a younger, African-American 18-year-previous child to now hold the duty of an entire metropolis, of a complete community. I can relate to that as effectively,” mentioned James.
Whether James, Carter, Werner and firm can successfully extract compelling comedy from the premise within the pitch remains to be seen, but it surely’s worth remembering that Starz was the community that introduced viewers the superb and sensible comedy series “Social gathering Down,” so it isn’t like Starz’s historical past is all “Spartacus” on a regular basis. Then again, “Get together Down” acquired cancelled after two seasons and 20 episodes, so it is in all probability a good idea for us to maintain our expectations for the shelf-life of this subsequent comedy endeavor manageably low in the meanwhile. For now, let’s just choose to hope it aspires to be one thing greater than “NBA Entourage,” consider it neat that LeBron can be concerned with a TELEVISION production that is neither “The LeBrons” nor “The Resolution,” and congratulate me on referencing “Grace Underneath Fireplace” in an NBA weblog post in September.
LeBron James is developing a cable TV sitcom for Starz called ‘Survivor’s Remorse’
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