It’s been just over a year since HBO gave their series order for an untitled series on the Los Angeles Lakers from Academy Award-winning director Adam McKay (“The Big Short,” “Vice,” “Step Brothers”). Since then, the project has been quietly simmering on a back burner through its development, with one big piece of casting missing from the recipe: Who will play the Lakers’ iconic head coach Pat Riley? From a recent report from Deadline, this gap is now filled, with Adrien Brody slated to star.
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The limited series is based on a book by Jeff Pearlman, “Showtime: Magic, Kareem, Riley, and the Los Angeles Lakers Dynasty of the 1980s,” which profiles the team’s remarkable domination of the league throughout their “Showtime” era of the ’80s. During this time, Brody’s head coach Pat Riley led the team to four championships, marked by his affinity for a fast-paced, aggressive offense.
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The series will be adapted for the screen by Max Borenstein. Borenstein has writing credits on each installment of Warner Bros.’s “MonsterVerse,” starting with Gareth Edwards’s “Godzilla” in 2014 and including the upcoming “Godzilla vs. Kong,” which is slated to premiere at the end of the month. Along with adapting Pearlman’s book, Borenstein is also acting as an executive producer with Adam McKay (who will direct the pilot) for McKay’s Hyperobject Industries, which is still enjoying their five-year first-look deal with HBO.
Adrien Brody won an Oscar for his memorable, heartbreaking performance in Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist.” Later this year, we’ll finally get to see his performance in Wes Anderson’s “The French Dispatch” and in Charlie Day’s debut “El Tonto.” As previously announced, the rest of the cast for the untitled Lakers series includes John C. Reilly, Jason Clarke, Quincy Isaiah, Solomon Hughes, Gaby Hoffmann, Hadley Robinson, and many others.
