Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Jerry West Blast HBO’s ‘Cheating and Uninteresting’ Collection ‘Profitable Time’

HBO‘s Profitable Time is a swaggering, sensational dramatization of a thrillingly glamorous second in basketball historical past. However some audience are not taking part in the acclaimed TV display: Former LA Lakers trainer Jerry West has demanded a retraction from HBO about the best way he is portrayed within the sequence, whilst former big name participant Kareem Abdul-Jabbar calls the display “intentionally cheating” and “drearily uninteresting.”

Profitable Time: The Upward push of the Lakers Dynasty tells the tale of the LA Lakers crew within the past due Nineteen Seventies and the Eighties, once they discovered a world-beating formulation with Magic Johnson and Abdul-Jabbar environment the court docket alight. The display stars John C. Reilly as new proprietor Jerry Buss, portrayed because the catalyst for this triumphant generation. Airing now and streaming on HBO Max, the sequence has already been renewed for a 2nd season. 

Jason Clarke performs trainer Jerry West, a former Lakers participant whose silhouette remains to be observed within the iconic NBA emblem. Within the display, West is depicted as a unstable (and fairly buffoonish) personality at odds with Buss. However West’s lawyer disputes this characterization in a letter to HBO, which says the sequence has “led to nice misery to Jerry and his circle of relatives” and calls for an apology and retraction from HBO. 

In line with the letter, Profitable Time “took a cheerful and tremendous a success Lakers generation and became it right into a pulpy cleaning soap opera.” The letter, revealed in complete in Closing date, says West had a harmonious courting with Buss.

Abdul-Jabbar additionally disparaged the display in his Substack e-newsletter, calling it a “Frankenstein’s monster” of gossip and fiction. “The problem with Profitable Time,” he mentioned, “is not such a lot that the filmmakers intentionally have shyed away from info as though they have been an STD, however that they changed cast info with flimsy cardboard fictions that do not cross deeper and be offering no revealing insights.” 

Profitable Time is according to the e book Showtime: Magic, Kareem, Riley and the Los Angeles Lakers Dynasty of the Eighties via Jeff Pearlman. The writer additionally weighed in, taking to Twitter to show that Abdul-Jabbar refused to be interviewed or concerned with the e book and TV display. 

HBO did not in an instant reply to a request for remark.