LeBron James to Executive Produce a TV Sitcom

A couple of years ago, LeBron James dipped a toe into the world of television production, helping to create the animated series “The LeBrons”. James and longtime friend/business partner Maverick Carter are taking an even bigger step this time, executive producing a sitcom about making it out of the projects. Per the AP: “After LeBron James won his second NBA championship this year, he talked about the improbability of his journey — ascending to world fame despite growing up with challenge after challenge in the inner city. Now James plans to explore that theme as part of ‘Survivor’s Remorse,’ a new show he’s developing with Starz. While he won’t star in the half-hour sitcom, he’ll be one of the executive producers of the show, which will explore the lives of two men from the streets who attain fame — one is an NBA star and one is not — and how they deal with friends and families in the wake of that success. ‘I think the main thing for me is, first of all, making it out of a place where you’re not supposed to. You’re supposed to be a statistic and end up like the rest of the people in the inner city — (and) being one of the few to make it out and everyone looking at you to be the savior,’ the Miami Heat superstar said in a phone interview last week. ‘When you make it out, everyone expects for — they automatically think that they made it out and it’s very tough for a young, African-American 18-year-old kid to now hold the responsibility of a whole city, of a whole community. I can relate to that as well,’ said James, who was 18 when he came to the NBA and is now a 28-year-old veteran. James is developing the show with his longtime friend and business partner, Maverick Carter; Tom Werner, the producer behind classic shows like ‘Roseanne’ and ‘The Cosby Show’; and actor Mike O’Malley, who will be an executive producer and is the show’s writer. Paul Wachter will also be an executive producer. ‘It’s definitely not an autobiographical series about my life or LeBron’s life; it’s fictional characters living in a fictional world,’ said Carter, before adding with a laugh: ‘LeBron is actually too famous, he would screw the show up if I tried to make a show about him.’ The show is based in North Philadelphia instead of Akron, Ohio, where the two are from: ‘More people can relate to it,’ explained Carter of Philadelphia.”