‘Two men forge a friendship over sport’ is something of a storytelling cliché. But in the assured hands of writer Rajiv Joseph and director Alice Hamilton, the connection made between two very different Ohio natives over their love of basketball – and particularly of fellow Ohioan, the legendary player LeBron ‘King’ James – succeeds in being funny and genuinely touching.
The play begins in February 2004. Cleveland is buzzing with the news that LeBron is coming to play for local team the Cavaliers. After yet another failed business venture, down-on-his-luck bartender Matt (Sam Mitchell) is trying to hawk some season tickets to Shawn (Enyi Okoronkwo), a wannabe writer who has just had a short story published.
The pair quickly exasperate each other – until, that is, they start talking about basketball, almost in-spite of themselves. From this ‘first quarter’, the play then skips through 2010, 2014 and 2016. It charts the ups and downs of their friendship and life choices against a wider backdrop including LeBron’s controversial decision in 2010 to move from the Cavaliers to Florida-based team Miami Heat.
Joseph’s beautifully observed script is full of telling details that show us – often in hilarious ways – what makes these differently lonely men tick. Shawn’s self-projection of being the only grown-up in the room can quickly break open into childlike enthusiasm. Meanwhile, Matt’s self-pitying lack of awareness of his many privileges is softened by genuine vulnerability.
Mitchell and Okoronkwo are exceptionally good as Matt and Shawn. Hamilton positions them at opposite ends of the traverse stage set (initially a bar and then Matt’s family curiosity shop) as if it were a basketball court of emotions, with the audience as spectators. Okoronkwo is always braced for defence. Mitchell wants to pass but can’t manage it. Their knockabout camaraderie is always one exposed nerve ending away from a deep-rooted jibe.
LeBron represents many things for these men. This production doesn’t just gesture at the passing years through their different models of phones. In a skilfully light-touch way, it brings America’s wider political and social landscape into its time frame. Shawn talks frustratedly about being silenced as a Black man by a TV exec. It’s also easy to imagine a world in which Matt, constantly talking about ‘the problem with America’, starts wearing a MAGA cap.
This isn’t a play with a tidily happy ending, but it’s also a hopeful one. By the end of the final scene, which involves little more than a crumpled-up ball of paper and a wastepaper bin, we’re left with an affecting sense of the power of a shared passion to create a fragile unity.
