'King James' Rules At The Mark Taper Forum

(l-r) Glenn Davis and Chris Perfetti in 'King James'
photo by Craig Schwartz Photography

By Darlene Donloe

King James sneaks up on you.

It starts off like it’s going to be about basketball, and in a way it is. But it’s so much more.

In reality, King James, now playing at the Mark Taper Forum through July 3, 2022, is really a play about friendship with basketball as a backdrop.

This is the story.

Basketball great “King” LeBron James’s reign in Cleveland brings promise, prosperity, and renewal to a city in desperate need of all three. It also brings together two men who communicate best when they are talking and arguing about sports.

King James, directed by Kenny Leon, is an intimate exploration of the place that sports and athletes occupy in our emotional lives and relationships. It explores the star player’s impact on Cleveland, from his rookie season to the city’s historic championship, and the lives of these two unlikely friends (Shawn and Matt) whose turbulent relationship is best navigated through their shared love of the sport in a verbal game of one-on-one. LeBron James is never seen in the show, but he serves as a symbol for the hopes, desires, and fears that they have bottled up since childhood.

The steady-paced show is presented to represent significant moments in James’ career starting with his rookie year, the year he left the Cavs for the Miami Heat when he returned to Cleveland and the year the Cavs won their first NBA championship.

You’d be hard-pressed to find two bigger King James fans than Shawn (Glenn Davis) and Matt (Chris Perfetti). Both men are the ultimate Cleveland Cavaliers fans, who strike up an improbable friendship anchored by their love of sports and their love and hate relationship with LeBron James.

Matt works at La Cave du Vin, an upscale wine bar in Cleveland Heights, where the first act action takes place.

Shawn, a Black writer has heard that Matt has some Cleveland Cavaliers season tickets to sell and is willing to shell out $2,000 to treat himself. You see, even though he’s a die-hard fan, Shawn has never been to a game in person.

Matt wants more money, after all, they are season tickets and he has bills to pay. One thing leads to another and Matt sells Shawn the tickets after he realizes he isn’t a “bandwagon fan.”

He then asks, “who are you going to take?”  Shawn hadn’t exactly thought that part through.  So, the two of them go together and thus start their friendship.

Their friendship hits a snag when Matt, who is white, proclaims that things would be better if LeBron James “knew his place.”  Shawn, who is Black, takes offense to the statement – essentially wondering out loud what Matt means by the perceived racist statement.

The two-part ways and the friendship becomes fractured. However, there is still an attachment because Shawn has struck up a true friendship with Matt’s mother, who owns a novelty store.

(l-r) Chris Perfetti and Glenn Davis in 'King James'
photo by Craig Schwartz Photography

Shawn leaves for Los Angeles to work on a television show and Matt, who said he would never do it, begins working in his family’s eccentric novelty store.

When Shawn returns, he drops by the novelty store and looks up Matt.

Their initial meeting is tense, but things ease up when they decide to play basketball using one of the wicker baskets.

Glenn Davis (one of the artistic directors of Steppenwolf Theatre Company and an ensemble acting member), as Shawn, is believable as a wide-eyed, die-hard fan. He’s the more level-headed of the two and treasures the friendship the two have created.

Chris Perfetti, who stars in Abbott Elementary on ABC, as Matt, plays an equally believable insecure white man. He’s quirky and a bit all over the place, but he has a good heart.

(l-r) Glenn Davis and Chris Perfetti star in 'King James'
photo by Chris Schwartz Photography

The best parts of the show are when the two are debating each other on the merits of LeBron James vs. Michael Jordan.

Matt believes LeBron, even as a rookie, has “already eclipsed Jordan.”  Shawn replies, “He hasn’t done anything yet,” to which Matt says, “Don’t matter. It’s implicational.”

King James is a satisfying two-character comedy/drama. Davis and Perfetti have palpable chemistry, which moves the show forward. You find yourself rooting for both men in their quest for satisfaction. King James is an incredibly enjoyable production helmed by Tony-winner Kenny Leon.

Actually, Khloe Janel is a DJ, standing in a booth offstage, keeping the audience rockin' by playing R&B and pop songs during the pre-show, in between scenes, and during intermission.

King James, directed by Kenny Leon and written by Rajiv Joseph, stars Glenn Davis and Chris Perfetti. 

Todd Rosenthal’s two, vastly different scenic designs are exceptional. Kudos to Samantha C. Jones (costume designer), Lee Fiskness (lighting designer), Rob Milburn, and Michael Bodeen (sound design).

On the DONLOE SCALE, D (don’t bother, O (oh, no), N (needs work), L (likable), O (oh, yeah), and E (excellent), King James gets an E (excellent).

Running time: 1 hour, 45 minutes. There is one 15-minute intermission.

King James, Mark Taper Forum, 135 N. Grand Avenue, Los Angeles, 8 p.m., Tues.-Fri.; 2:30 and 8 p.m. Sat.; 1 and 6:30 p.m. Sun.; no Monday performances, through July 3; $30-$110; www.CenterTheatreGroup.org or 213 628 2772 or 213 972-7231.

COVID protocol: Proof of full vaccinations is required. Masks are also required.

 

MOJA: A Music Saga Kicks Off Black Music Month

 (Photo Left) Weedie Braimah is a djembefola—a master of the djembe, a West African drum with a hollow wood body and an animal skin stretched and fastened over the top, the origins of which date back to the 12th Century. 

 

MOJA: A Music Saga, the history of Black Music from Africa to America’s Gospel, Blues, Jazz, R&B, Funk, and Hip-Hop is kicking off Black Music Month with the story of Black music and its origins. The eight-volume set rolls out one new audio experience per month this summer.

June delivers Volume 6 of the MOJA epic story. It is perfectly suited for Black Music Month as this music from Africa in America continues to grow, expand, and morph into multiple formats that shape culture through the eras of segregation, race records, and civil rights.  

Featured vocalists on MOJA: A Music Saga, Volume 6 include an eclectic mix of gifted singers from around the world such as Cuban-born Pedrito Martinez,  10 x Grammy Award winners Take 6, England’s Oli Brown, Take 6 soloist Mark Kibble, and Josh Kegler of New Orleans, who give the listener a symphony of black music sounds from Afro Cuban, Doo Wop, Blues, and the British invasion to Rock and Roll to Funk.

MOJA’s emotional stories tug at your soul in their entirety from volume one-8.  The voice actors who bring the troubled, brilliant, yet complicated characters to life are 3x Grammy Nominee, Emmy Award winner, and Blues Hall of Famer Billy Branch who plays the fearless grandfather Innes Ellis, patriarch of the Muziki family, and actor, rapper, singer, and producer, Darius McCrary as Sitano, Innes’ Hip Hop superstar grandson.

MOJA: A Music Saga is a 165-year journey where Billy Branch’s character Iness Ellis, the fourth generation of the Ellis family of musicians in America, unpacks their musical legacy to his grandson Sitano through historically based stories intertwined with the evolution of musical genres of American music rooted in the soul of African music. 

MOJA: A Music Saga is a 75-song musical event that took five years to complete. It utilized the talents of 500 musicians, singers, artists, producers, Grammy Award winners, and nominees from around the globe.

Grammy-nominated musician, producer, writer, and creator of MOJA: A Music Saga, Carl Gustafson said, “Integrity toward the music is paramount. The songs about Africa were recorded in Africa by Africans. The songs of Cuba were recorded in Cuba by Cubans. Same in New Orleans, Chicago, Mississippi, England, and everywhere else the story went.

MOJA: A Music Saga is an audio adventure that skillfully uses skits, sound effects, and original music to tell the story of how African music has influenced American music through seven generations of the Ellis family. The family’s story starts with Moja Musiki, a.k.a. Moja Ellis, a tall, attractive, strong African female drummer who was taken from her home in East Africa and sold into slavery in New Orleans in the 1850s. She survived the perils of slavery and raised her son Billi Ellis using her music skills. The Ellis family gift of music was then passed down to Billi’s daughter, musician and band leader Tattie, her son Innes, and his daughter Tanya, ending in today’s time with Moja’s great-great-grandson, Hip Hop star Sitano and his two-year-old daughter Sabbath.

Gustafson said of the saga wrapped in music, “This story never happened exactly this way, but it happened thousands of times over many hundreds of years. This is the palate that the storyteller, artist, and novelist, works with as the events come back to life.”

Executive produced by two-time Grammy Award-winning Blues great Bobby Rush, and world-renowned Djembe master, Weedie Braimah, MOJA: A Music Saga immerses the listener in an entertaining, dramatic, sometimes gritty, and realistic history lesson of a people and their music, from slavery, reconstruction, Jim Crow and segregation to the civil rights era.

Gustafson adds, “The MOJA saga yanks the guts out of Bobby Rush’s tragic young life and grinds it into grist for the triumphant music story of Black America.”

MOJA: A Music Saga is destined to have an international impact on music lovers and historians alike, changing the world's view of Africa’s influence on American Music forever.

For more information, or to stream or purchase MOJA: A Music Saga visit:  www.mojasaga.com

 

Los Angeles Women's Theatre Festival Is June 18

 

Hot Off the Press is a program of new solo writings presented by talented scribes in staged readings. The show will be presented at 6 p.m. PDT on Saturday, June 18, 2022. The theme is Fathers, Friends, and Freedom in celebration of the Juneteenth and Father’s Day week-ends. The new program includes: 

Single Black Father. Written and performed by Sandra Booker. A daughter reflects on the past times she had with her father and how he raised her in a single-parent household. 

Love Letters to Las Vegas. Written and performed by Angel Felix. A daughter remembers the memory of her father and the moments they bonded together, especially over their heritage. 

Black Hair Peace. Written and performed by Lynda La Rose. A chronicle of poems from the perspective of a Black woman experiencing her identity through her hair. 

One Woman’s Play. Written and performed by Nataylia Roni. A Black woman’s acceptance of who she is, who she was, and who she will be. 

The program will be hosted by Jahna Houston and Jessica Lynn Johnson.

Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival’s Co-Founder and Executive Producer is Adilah Barnes. 

HOW TO ATTEND: Saturday, June 18, 2022, at 6 p.m. PDT. Hot Off the Press: Fathers, Friends, and Freedom is an exciting evening of new works written and performed by remarkable authors in staged readings. Presented by Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival. Tickets are free. A donation of $10 is suggested. Order at https://lawtf.org . A Zoom link will be sent to attendees after their ticket reservation is confirmed.

The Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival is a non-profit arts organization supported in part by the California Arts Council, LA County Arts and Culture, Lendistry, Department of Cultural Affairs of the City of Los Angeles, City of Culver City, City National Bank, California Wellness Foundation, KPFK 90.7,Women in Media, Union Bank and Adilah Barnes Productions.

 

Hart and Harrelson Star In The Man From Toronto

Kevin Hart and Woody Harrelson star in Netflix's newest action and comedy film, THE MAN FROM TORONTO,  set to debut on the streamer on June 24, 2020.

The film is directed by Patrick Hughes and stars Kevin Hart, Woody Harrelson, Kaley Cuoco, Jasmine Mathews, Lela Loren, Pierson Fodé, Jencarlos Canela, and Ellen Barkin.

The film is produced by Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal, and Steve Tisch, with the story by Robbie Fox and Jason Blumenthal and screenplay by Robbie Fox and Chris Bremner.

 www.netflix.com/TheManFromToronto