LeBron James continues to make savvy moves, navigating the cross section of sports and entertainment. LeBron and business partner Maverick Carter’s SpringHill Productions created athlete lifestyle project, “uninterrupted” has received a multi-million dollar boost from Warner Bros.
Turner and Warner Bros. have invested $15.8 million into the project per The Hollywood Reporter. Uninterrupted gives select athletes the opportunity to create video content that focuses on the “away from the game” aspects. It appears on the Turner owned Bleacher Report. The site averages 50 million views per month.
The cash flush from the studio was provided with the goal of creating content around the lifestyle of professional athletes across all platforms, including mobile, web and social plus television and film.
This venture is why LeBron James recently purchased a new home in Brentwood – a California suburb.
In addition to the video content for Bleacher Report, the plans are to also produce these projects for 2016.
- Dear Football: The 2015 Elite 11 Story, a documentary series about the nation’s top high school quarterbacks
- 5th Quarter Club, an interview series in which recently retired NBA great Steve Nash interviews other retired athletes
- The Gronks an animated comedy series about the life of the NFL star, who describes it as “a Family Guy-type of show.” For Gronkowski
And this December, a five-part special that will air entirely on Facebook, using 360 technology will be Striving for Greatness, a five-episode series featuring an inside look at King James as he prepared for his 13th NBA season.
Spearheading the project along with LeBron is his business partner Maverick Carter. This fall Carter lectured at Harvard Business School about UnInterrupted. Four years ago a case study was done by HBS on LeBron’s second career as sports marketing endorser.
The link between athletes and the world of entertainment is a subject I cover in my book, PostGame Pass: access into “the life” which is available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.
