Spoilers for the season premiere of Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty, “One Ring Don't Make a Dynasty,” lie ahead.
Winning Time made its highly anticipated return to HBO for its second season this weekend and quickly dropped viewers back into the world of Dr. Jerry Buss and the “Showtime” Lakers. This was an eventful premiere, as it tackled Magic Johnson’s injury ahead of the ‘80-’81 season, introduced the new (and not-so-improved) coach Paul Westhead and provided a brief glimpse at the 1984 NBA Finals. Aside from the basketball-related drama, there was also some tension amongst the Buss family. I’m talking about that heated family Monopoly scene, and cast members John C. Reilly and Hadley Robinson got candid with us about what it was like filming that moment.
It was established during the first season that the Buss clan enjoys a good, competitive game of Monopoly. (Now, we need to put some serious emphasis on that second adjective.) This week’s episode saw Jerry facing off with three of his kids – Jeanie, Johnny and Jimmy – at his comfy abode. The game starts friendly enough but takes a serious turn when Johnny provides Jimmy with a prime real estate asset and opts not to eliminate him from the game. Said moves ultimately lead the disappointed Jerry to berate his sons for not possessing cut-throat attitudes or being proactive as prospective businessmen. His boys then respond by calling him out for trying to force them to be a family unit. All the while, poor Jeanie can only try to keep the evening going as planned.
The scene is very significant and says a lot about John C. Reilly’s Jerry Buss as a parent and a man. So I couldn’t help but ask Reilly and Hadley Robinson about shooting it when I spoke to them on behalf of CinemaBlend during the Winning Time Season 2 junket. When I chatted with the actors weeks ahead of the SAG-AFTRA strike, they provided some interesting thoughts on the big Buss blow-up. (Say that three times fast.) As cringeworthy as the sequence likely was for viewers, it sounds like it was even tougher for Reilly to actually perform:
Yeah, that was one of those things, like, you almost feel bad while you're doing it. Because it's such a bad moment for a dad, you know? Anytime your dad loses his temper and starts criticizing you and really going after you for your shortcomings, it's intense. Nobody wants to hear that. And even dads who do that to regret it afterwards. Yeah, my character regrets it after that. But I think it was a really telling scene about the belief system of Jerry, you know?
Jerry does indeed regret calling out his boys later on, though his desire for them to be shrewd and forge their own professional paths remains. On the flip side, a person who does seem to have that killer instinct is Jeanie, who’s still climbing the corporate ladder within the Lakers organization this year. Hadley Robinson continues to be incredibly wise when it comes to her portrayal of the future exec and proved that with how she handled this scene, which she relished:
Yeah, that was really fun. I mean, everybody did so well on that scene. And you know, I think the choice I made was that Jeanie is sitting there, and she's just trying to have a game night with the boys. And it's a lot of testosterone, and you know, she puts her head in her lap, and she's like, ‘Oh, my gosh, these men again. Can't we just have game night?’ But it was a lot of fun to shoot. Thomas [Mann] and McCabe [Slye] are wonderful actors, and they made some really great choices. And yeah, I love that scene.
You really can’t help but appreciate the scene, regardless of how uncomfortable it might be. Director Salli Richardson-Whitfield and writers/EP Max Borenstein and Rodney Barnes – in collaboration with the actors – paint an intriguing image of the Buss family dynamic with this exchange. As John C. Reilly explained, it especially gives one insight into Jerry’s mentality and how he applies it to childrearing. Fatherhood was something that the actual Dr. Buss notably treasured, and Reilly later conveyed during our Zoom interview that the same is true when it comes to Winning Time’s version of the NBA owner:
He loved his sons. He loved all his kids, they were so important to him, and you can see it through his actions. You know, he kept that family close, as close as he could, for as long as he could. So yeah, that was an intense scene to shoot. Luckily, like Hadley said, I felt I had a great relationship with all three of [the actors]. You know, Thomas Mann is a good old pal of mine and McCabe, I got to know during the shoot. Hadley and I've gotten to know each other. So when you have the safety and comfort of having good relationships with people, you can really let them have it.
I can definitely understand how that level of comfortability amongst the actors would’ve been helpful during that particular point of production. All four are certainly professionals in their own rights and seemed to play off each other well. Still, John C. Reilly is the show’s anchor and had to contend with some serious “pressure” when taking on the role of Buss. It shouldn’t be too shocking, however, that the veteran actor has been able to pull it off. His talents are well known, with even the real Jeanie Buss paying him a compliment by sharing her late dad’s admiration for him as an actor.
If for some reason you’re thinking family Monopoly night amounts to the most awkward scene of the season, think again. The table is clearly being set for a strenuous string of episodes, and John C. Reilly, Hadley Robinson and their co-stars had to go all in. Reilly also told us the board game sequence marks only one moment in which Jerry “cracks under the pressure” this season. So keep that in mind as you await what’s to come.
Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty airs on Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO as part of the 2023 TV schedule. Anyone with a Max subscription can also stream the episodes when they premiere.
