Review of Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty (Series, 2022)

REVIEW / SERIES REVIEW – Produced by Adam McKay, the “Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty” series looks at the transformation and rise of the famous Los Angeles basketball club at the dawn of the 80s. fascinating, which gives pride of place to its gallery of characters.

Winning Time: the fascinating backstage of a legendary club

Fans of Adam McKay will have no trouble finding the filmmaker’s style in the opening of the pilot of Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty. Lying in bed with conquest in the dawn of the 80s, real estate investor Jerry Buss embarks on a passionate reflection on basketball. In the seconds that follow, the businessman leaves the Playboy mansion in which an orgy apparently took place the day before and announces to the spectator that he is about to buy a club. And not just any.

Having become the owner of the Lakers, Buss intends to allow the team than in a full lull to familiarize yourself with the heights of the NBA again. The aged visual treatment, the editing filled with abrupt cuts, and the way in which the characters break the fourth wall immediately appeal to the viewer. Relevant choices immediately take him into the most excessive decade of the 20th century for the United States.

The executive producer of this eight-episode program created by screenwriters Jim Hecht and Max Borenstein, Adam McKay breathes the dynamism and the playful side of The Big Short: The Heist of the Century. But if it is not exempt from complexity, shenanigans, and other strategies, the world of basketball is still more accessible than that of finance. This allows the series to easily take the public behind the scenes of a club that will recover thanks to an association of multiple talents, who will manage to overcome errors of judgment, lack of communication, problems of ego as well as the accidents and unforeseen events of everyday life.

Masterful John C. Reilly

From the smart investment of Jerry Buss to the prowess of the team on the field, through marketing decisions, the choice of sponsors, or the emergence of real energy between the players during training, Winning Time covers all aspects complementary and necessary for the rebirth of the Lakers. But the most important dimension of the series remains the masterful characterization of its multitude of characters.

Jerry Buss obviously leads the dance. His outrageous style and taste for partying in no way hinder his professionalism. On the contrary, the businessman uses it to convince his various partners. If the desire to see Will Ferrell in this role that he wanted so much is first present – the refusal of Adam McKay has also widened the gap between them since he preferred his sidekick Brothers in spite of themselves – John C. Reilly has no trouble overshadowing him.

The actor finds a register that he has already experienced alongside Paul Thomas Anderson in Boogie Nights. The actor embodies a protagonist who is both nerdy and deeply charismatic, scathing and demanding but respectful with his collaborators, lighthearted but sometimes overtaken by a certain gravity, especially in his relationship with his mother Jessie (Sally Field).

Essential secondary characters

Over the episodes, Jerry Buss steps back to allow other essential characters to exist. The development of the hesitant but determined and overflowing with confidence young Magic Johnson (Quincy Isaiah) is probably the other most developed axis of the series.

But those of the former player Pat Riley (Adrien Brody) eager to work within the club, the coach on the verge of a nervous breakdown Jerry West (Jason Clarke), the rigorous coach Jack McKinney (Tracy Letts), or even by thoughtful Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Solomon Hughes) are never overlooked. Jason Segel, Gaby Hoffmann, Julianne Nicholson, Rob Morgan, Wood Harris, and Gillian Jacobs complete this perfect cast.

A gripping sports drama

The fictions around the sport are legion across the Atlantic. Winning Time seems at the crossroads of two significant projects belonging to the genre: The Strategist and Me Tonya. Like the first, it plunges the viewer into a fundamental universe of American culture with an ability to address amateurs and neophytes alike. The series does not hesitate to put a basketball in the background to focus on the decisions, the secrets, and the chances that lead to victory or defeat, thus going beyond the framework of the game.

And like the biopic on the skater Tonya Harding, she seeks the complicity of the spectator by addressing him directly.