King James at Hampstead Theatre – review

King James is one of those American plays about male friendship.  It also fits into the sub-genre of a work that uses sport – in this case basketball – as a metaphor for life, by taking the history of basketball player LeBron James as its framework and source.

It’s a perfectly pleasant way to spend just under a couple of hours, but the tightness of playwright Rajiv Joseph’s structure – four scenes like the four quarters of a basketball match – and the way that the fortunes of “King James” run in parallel to the fluctuating fates of the protagonists constricts its ability to probe very deep or soar very high.

It opens in 2004 with two 21-year-old strangers Matt (Sam Mitchell) and Shawn (Ényì Okoronkwo) meeting in the wine shop where Matt is working in Cleveland.  He’s lost some money in a business deal and wants to recoup his debts by selling his season tickets for the local basketball team the Cavaliers, in the middle of James’ rookie season. Shawn has come into some money and wants to buy them because James is already on his way to becoming a legend.

The deal forms the beginning of a friendship that unfolds over the next 12 years, as James leaves the Cavs, moves to the Miami Heat (seen at the time as a massive betrayal) and then returns to lead his hometown club to an unlikely championship victory. Over the same period jealousies and tensions between the two men also unfold.

They are an unlikely couple to begin with. Matt is a prickly under-achiever, born with advantage but always failing; he’s prone to sweeping statements about his failing love life (“there is injustice in the world that is not basketball related”) or the state of the nation (“I keep waiting for Cleveland to grow a backbone and it just won’t. That’s exactly what’s wrong with America, head to toe”.)

Shawn is quieter, more thoughtful, finding his way, but casual with women and uncertain of his own talent. He quickly abandons dreams of becoming a novelist to ply his trade as a television writer. He talks to Matt’s mother when his friend does not.

The most interesting theme in the play is the way in which sport can replace religion as a purpose in life – “like most religions, though, it’s rotten to the core” – and the manner in which men who have absolutely nothing in common can bond over this common passion. The great basketball debate over who is the best player of all time between Michael Jordan and LeBron James provides a sub-text to the passing of the years.

The dialogue is smart and often funny and delivered by both actors with attractive casualness; but both characters are under-written to some extent.  The development of their friendship, its twists and turns, is never quite convincing, and their comings together and fallings out feel formulaically designed to make points.

Alice Hamilton’s fluent and detailed direction can’t quite disguise this. And the need to change the set (nicely designed by Good Teeth) in the middle of the action means it feels over-extended. For all its good nature, King James ends up more airball than slam dunk.