That Time Drake Went on LeBron’s TV Show to Talk Shit About Kanye
Where does HBO’s “The Shop” go from here?
Drake has been called the LeBron James of rap. In terms of productivity and professional staying power it’s an apt comparison. It might be most apt though, in terms of cultural relevancy. They’re the faces of their respective industries and they share an ability to make the world stop and listen when they say something. On the second episode of LeBron James’ HBO show The Shop, the two of them sit down, drink wine and create a piece of premium television that, for at least a few days, is the LeBron James of half hour talk shows.
Inside a small barbershop sit five professional basketball players and Maverick Carter. It’s nighttime outside, but the vanity lights inside show the white brick walls and wood framed mirrors that line them. Conversation is bouncing around the room. The buzz of hair clippers clicks off, the snip of scissors, the clippers click back on. Mohamed Bamba is heading a discussion on the not-so-subtle racial biases involved in NBA scouting. The group sitting in barber chairs around Mo includes Victor Oladipo, Elena Delle Donne, Ben Simmons, LeBron and the aforementioned Carter. They take turns speaking, offering their take on the topic of the moment.
It’s hard to tell how organic the conversation is. It’s a relaxed vibe, but everyone seems to have brought their own topic — the thing you’d expect them to talk about on a high profile discussion show. Victor Oladipo came prepared to sing, Mo Bamba to talk about his renaissance-man tendencies, Elena Delle Donne to underscore the difference between how society views male and female athletes, Ben Simmons to explain life without a jumper. LeBron and Maverick moderate.
Whether the casual feel of the conversation is edited in, enhanced by b roll of guests sipping wine, is one small curiosity of an undeniably entertaining scene. Where else do you see athletes of this caliber sitting down together, on camera, to talk about things beyond the box score? They could be reading from prepared statements and the mere facts of the scene would make the show worth watching. In fact, the celebrity cache of episode two is a huge step down from episode one’s death lineup of Draymond Green, Michael Bennett, Candice Parker, Odell Beckham Jr., Vince Staples, Jarrod Carmichael, Snoop Dogg and John Stewart.
That is, until Drake walks in.
Strutting into the shop, to the sound of his own music, Drake goes around the room giving dap and swapping smiles with the young hoopers. He settles into a chair, sips from a wine glass and gauges the room. After a couple minutes of entertaining the full group, the youngsters leave the room and LeBron, Maverick, Drake and the world’s quietest barber have the shop to themselves.
The topics of discussion shift from balancing eclectic interests, crafting a professional life and the subtleties of race and gender inequality to truly important things, you know, like Maverick’s dad’s favorite song on Drake’s newest album. Once the niceties are out of the way though, it becomes clear that we’re watching a Drake press conference. He came with an agenda and he is going to hit all his talking points. By the time he’s done, he’s aired out enough dirty laundry to turn The Shop into a Laundromat, and he’s created a moment in pop culture history that we’ll forever remember as “that time Drake went on LeBron’s show to talk shit about Kanye.”
After a summer that saw a Drake and Pusha T rap battle break the internet, and a recent, pitiful Whitehouse visit from Kanye West, Drake’s performance on The Shop is a timely and comprehensive dose of air-clearing.
He calls out Kanye for being a manipulative, ghost writer-needing nutcase. He calls out Pusha T for breaking the unwritten rules of rap battles, namely going at the sick and helpless, and he embraces his recently publicized fatherhood.
I’ll leave the rap beef refereeing to the hip-hop heads, but it was plain to anyone watching that what LeBron and Maverick put on television during episode two of The Shop is a public thrashing of Kanye West. America loves a good public celebrity thrashing. And right now, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone America enjoys dragging through the mud more than Donald Trump’s large adult son Kanye West. To have Drake lead that charge? Even for just a few minutes? The internet stopped, twitter fingers twitched, articles were written, talking heads ranted.
And so all of a sudden LeBron has created his most noteworthy TV moment since The Decision — a significant landmark for the budding media magnate.
So where does The Shop go from here?
Its simple yet nebulous concept, buoyed by LeBron’s celebrity, will go wherever he takes it. A near future in which The Shop isn’t a darling of the HBO Sports lineup is hard to imagine. It’s a highly produced video podcast in a culture clamoring for celebrity conversations. But it’s hard not to wonder: has The Shop already peaked?
