1980s Lakers Series Casts Bo Burnham As Basketball Legend Larry Bird
Bo Burnham has signed on to play Larry Bird in HBO's Los Angeles Lakers drama series. Another Adam McKay-HBO partnership, the project is based on Jeff Pearlman's 2014 book, Showtime: Magic, Kareem, Riley, and the Los Angeles Lakers Dynasty of the 1980s. The "Showtime" Lakers won five NBA championship in the eighties, twice beating (and once being beaten by) Bird's Boston Celtics in the NBA Finals.
Now, Deadline reports that Burnham will play Larry Bird in HBO's LA Lakers drama. The comedian and Eighth Grade writer-director recently made a return to acting in the Oscar-nominated, Promising Young Woman. He joins the show's already stacked cast that includes Sally Field, Michael Chiklis, John C. Reilly, and fellow recent addition, Adrien Brody. Though a premiere is not yet scheduled for the as-yet-untitled series, McKay (Succession) is set to direct the pilot, which was written by co-executive producer, Max Borenstein (Godzilla vs. Kong).
Burnham's comedic sensibilities (and prodigious height) should help him take on the role of Bird. Known for his legendary shooting stroke and acerbic wit, "The Hick From French Lick" is one of the NBA's all-time greats. A 3x MVP and 10x All-Star, Bird spent his entire playing career with the Boston Celtics, whose stadium sits around 25 miles from Burnham's hometown of Hamilton, Massachusetts. As detailed in his 2018 New Yorker profile, the 6'5" Burnham once wrote a childhood letter to his future self asking, "Are you going to Duke to play basketball? If not that's okay...." Though Bird played his college years at Indiana State, Bo Burnham might at least take solace in the fact that he will get to portray a top-tier Hall of Famer when HBO's hotly-anticipated Lakers series finally arrives.
Source: Deadline
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