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Earlier this year, LeBron James was told to “shut up and dribble” by FOX News host Laura Ingraham because the star basketball player discussed politics during a sitdown with ESPN’s Cari Champion. This month, LeBron was again a target for discussing politics, this time directly having his intelligence questioned by president Donald Trump following an interview with CNN’s Don Lemon to discuss the opening of his new “I Promise” school in Akron, Ohio.
But LeBron is not backing down. In fact, he is taking Ingraham’s tagline and turning it into the name of a new docuseries for Showtime.
On Monday, Aug. 6, Showtime announced that LeBron will serve as the executive producer for a three-part docuseries on the network appropriately titled “Shut Up And Dribble.” The series will take “a powerful inside look at the changing role of athletes in our fraught cultural and political environment.”
The newest Los Angeles Laker is producing the series alongside Maverick Carter and Gotham Chopra, with a premiere expected in October.
“If being a star athlete is inherently a political experience, ‘Shut Up and Dribble’ tells that complex and dramatic story from the past to the present and from the inside out,” David Nevins, president and chief executive of Showtime Networks Inc. said in a statement.
“LeBron James is one of many competitors whose place in the spotlight has led not to silence but perspective, and he, Maverick Carter and Gotham Chopra have given us an important, insightful docuseries that should bring their fans and fellow citizens to a higher level of discourse, rather than the dismissal satirized in the title.”
The docuseries will begin with Ingraham’s comments to James and serve “as a prologue to the series as it chronicles the modern history of the NBA and its players, starting with the 1976 merger of the freewheeling ABA and the more conventional NBA of today.”
Thanks for the inspiration, Laura Ingraham.
