King James by Rajiv Joseph at Barrington Stage Company
Nothing But Net
By: Charles Giuliano - Aug 17, 2025
King James
By Rajiv Joseph
Directed by Rob Ruggiero
Actors: Blake Morris (Shawn), Gregory Perri (Matt)
Scenic design, Luke Cantarella; Costumes, Danielle Preston; Lighting, John Lasiter; Sound, Kevin L. Alexander.
Barrington Stage Company
St. Germaine Stage
Pittsfield, Mass.
August 12-31, 2025
Like a basketball game, this well written and engaging two-hander, King James, by Rajiv Joseph is divided into four quarters in two acts: First Quarter, February 2004, Rookie of the Year; Second Quarter, July 2010. Six and a half years later, The Decision: Third Quarter, four years later, Return of The King; Fourth Quarter, June 2016, two years later, The Parade.
One comes to feel for Cleveland, a regional sports town, which languished for 50 long seasons before winning the NBA title in 2014 driven by super star Lebron James. We vividly feel the agony and ecstasy of this saga through the lens of the fans Shawn (Blake Morris) and Matt (Gregory Perri).
During The First Quarter they meet as strangers in Matt’s wine bar to haggle over the sale of center court, prized season tickets for pairs of 19 Cleveland Cavaliers home games featuring James in his rookie season. Matt, a nerdy white guy, has debts and needs cash. He wants $6,000 for the ducats. That’s beyond the means of Shawn (Blake Morris) a young black man working three jobs one of which is writing fiction. He has some cash from the recent publication of a short story.
Matt’s dad, who is no longer in condition to use them, has been a life long season tickets subscriber. Fed up with bailing out his son the tickets have been handed over as a final bulwark against terminal debt.
The animated haggling occurs in a stunning set designed by Luke Cantarella. It’s a cozy cave with brick and wine bottles as well as a bar and a table with chairs. During the second act the set swivels to reveal Armand’s a furniture repair and second hand store which is the family business. Matt, struggling as a bar owner, dreads ending up there. A college drop out with limited skills he is hanging by a thread.
In a gesture of hospitality Matt offers a drink to Shawn who initially responds that he doesn’t drink. There is no revelation when that changed as the drama evolved.
There are interesting moves as Matt has a way of swinging in and out of the bar. Both actors have fluid and expressive body language. With mounting frustration, however, Matt makes multiple attempts at burying a balled up newspaper into a trash can. Both men have a deep love of the game with a stunning finale when they play one-on-one.
The playwright delineates a subtle transition as the characters evolved into besties. While Shawn scored the tickets with a “final offer” of $2,000 it was for pairs and they attended the courtside games together. It seems that Shawn had never attended a game but the kicker here is to see “King James.” There is a running debate as to who is the GOAT (Greatest of All Time), James or Michael Jordan.
Born and raised in Akron, Ohio, Lebron James ‘The King’ was selected by the Cleveland Cavaliers with the first overall pick of the 2003 NBA draft. He won Rookie of the Year and quickly established himself as one of the league's premier players, leading Cleveland to its first NBA Finals appearance in 2007 and winning the scoring title in 2008. After winning back-to-back MVPs in 2009 and 2010, he left the Cavaliers and joined the Miami Heat as a free agent in 2010, a controversial move announced in the nationally televised special titled The Decision.
With the Heat, James won his first two NBA championships in 2012 and 2013, earning MVP and Finals MVP honors both years. After four seasons in Miami, he returned to Cleveland in 2014, leading the Cavaliers to their first-ever championship in 2016 by overcoming a 3–1 deficit against the Golden State Warriors and ending the Cleveland sports curse. He signed with the Lakers in 2018, winning another title in 2020 and becoming the first player to win Finals MVP with three different teams. At 40 he is now the oldest player in the NBA.
These facts are vividly portrayed in the Four Quarters. While focused on sports the glue of this engaging drama is the evolving relationship between these friends and fans. Shawn defines fan as derived from fanatic.
Shawn is welcomed into the family and sits with Matt’s father at his death bed. Even when there is a falling out he remains connected to Matt’s mother. By contrast Matt dined with Shawn’s family only once.
There is a rift when Shaw announces that in three months he will move to New York to attend graduate school. He is one of just ten accepted to a screenwriting program. It will cost $50,000 for each of two years. After which he will move to LA to pursue a career.
This is crushing news to Matt who feels left behind. Later, having completed the program, we find him repairing an armadillo the mascot and namesake of the shop. He wears a company shirt with Armand’s and Shawn. Matt, in the meantime, has failed in an attempt to establish a trendy bar and restaurant. This is, after all folks, Cleveland where dreams die. There is a reversal as Matt’s prospect dim and those of Shawn are on the rise.
But he is broke with crushing student loans and has to get to LA to pitch a screenplay as part of landing an eventual gig with a sitcom. To help his friend, Matt offers to pony up for plane ticket and hotel room.
It’s 2010 and in what is called “The Decision” on national TV James announced that he was leaving Cleveland for the Miami Heat. This is a knife in the heart to these Cavs fans.
There is debate about what couldah, shouldah happened. Impulsively, Matt blurts out that James stepped out of and should have known his “place.” Shawn is shocked and angered demanding to know what Matt meant. The obvious racism emerges and Shawn wants to know, what in Matt’s terms, is his “place.” There was a sudden shift in the play from cheerful bantering to dead serious. Until then this friendship of black and white dudes seemed a bit too good to be true.
It got resolved, and there is an ersatz happy ending, but in racist America the wounds are deep and never really heal.