As of an hour ago, I didn't know this enormous, mahogany-walled edifice existed. The Mansion's VIP-only villas, decorated in the style of a Florentine, yes, mansion, are hidden behind a warren of secure hallways linked to the MGM Grand's high-roller tables. "This," says Carter, barefoot and raspy-voiced, swaddled in gray sweats and a black hoodie that reads UNINTERRUPTED, "is like the All-Star Game." Welcome to an ironfisted coach's posse-driven fever dream. The all-stars Carter is referring to are the likes of Google, Amazon, Verizon, Facebook and Twitter, the luminaries of the planet's biggest tech convention, the Consumer Electronics Show. Carter's business partner, James, is back East with the Cavs - the man, after all, has a day job. Meanwhile, Carter, head of SpringHill Entertainment, their multiplatform production company, has hosted a dozen meetings over the past three days with chief marketing officers, media execs and ad agencies. "Maverick's network is at the highest levels of business in the U.S. and abroad," says Harvard Business School professor Anita Elberse, who published a case study about James and Carter in 2009. "He stands shoulder to shoulder with Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates. And then, in the entertainment world, it's a ridiculous list of movers and shakers."Įarlier today, Carter moderated a Life Off the Court panel with Green and Bosh. Green, who has the day off between home games, was a founding partner of Uninterrupted, SpringHill's online network for athlete-centric, nonjournalistic projects. And Bosh's nap owes to the daylong gauntlet of CES meetings Carter helped arrange. Now, as the 6-foot-4 Carter leans back in a wooden chair, his right leg up on a desk, he takes stock of the game plan that he and his decidedly more famous partner have committed to: "LeBron and I have always been interested in the long game. And the long game here is to build a media company. Jocks, of course, have always cashed in as actors or "human billboards," as one Hollywood agent puts it. Simpson in The Naked Gun, Shaquille O'Neal in any of his 28 acting credits.) But SpringHill, named for the Akron projects where James lived until his rookie year, is attempting to win a harder game. Consider: Two decades ago, when Jordan was making Space Jam, he leveraged his celebrity to get Warner Bros. to erect an outdoor court for him and his buddies to use between takes. Eighteen months ago, James and Carter persuaded that same studio to ink them to an overall production deal - for film, television and digital video - that Warner Bros. and Turner Sports invested $15.8 million into Uninterrupted.Īnd so as James trudges toward a seventh straight NBA Finals, he delegates to Carter, trusting his erstwhile high school teammate to build out the SpringHill and Uninterrupted portfolios. And Carter, in turn, relies on an inner circle that includes their high-powered entertainment agent, Ari Emanuel, the co-CEO of William Morris Endeavor. "We're still climbing Mount Kilimanjaro," James says.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |