Bo Burnham Cast as Basketball Star Larry Bird for an Upcoming HBO Max Show, Jason Segel Joins as Paul Westhead Too

HBO Max is developing a series about the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1980s, and they’ve just found their Larry Bird.

 

According to Deadline, one of the most talented entertainers in the business right now, Bo Burnham, has signed on to play the famous basketball player Larry Bird in the upcoming show, which is coming from Adam McKay. And that is not all for the casting news concerning the series, because it looks like Jason Segel is coming back to TV. The huge actor from How I Met Your Mother fame is going to play Paul Westhead in the show.

 

If you think those names are huge for the cast, just take a look at the rest: Michael Chiklis as Red Auerbach, Sally Field as Jessie Buss, Adrien Brody as Pat Riley, John C. Reilly as Jerry Buss, Jason Clarke as Jerry West, Quincy Isaiah as Magic Johnson, Solomon Hughes as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Gaby Hoffmann as Claire Rothman, Hadley Robinson as Jeanie Buss, DeVaughn Nixon as Norm Nixon, Molly Gordon as Linda Zafrani, Rob Morgan as Earvin Johnson Sr., Spencer Garrett as Chick Hearn, Kirk Bovill as Donald Sterling, Delante Desouza as Michael Cooper, Stephen Adly Guirgis as Frank Mariani, Tamera Tomakili as Earletha “Cookie” Kelly, and Joey Brooks as Lon Rosen.

 

Adam McKay will executive produce the show via his Hyperobject Industries banner. Max Borenstein and Jim Hecht are writing, with Hecht acting as executive producer along with Jason Shuman, Scott Stephens, and Rodney Barnes. It will be based on Jeff Pearlman’s book Showtime: Magic, Kareem, Riley, and the Los Angeles Lakers Dynasty of the 1980s.

 

Burnham is a comedian, actor, film director, screenwriter, poet, and singer, and he excels at all of it. His directorial debut Eighth Grade, which he also wrote, was a massive hit among the independent film world back in 2018. He most recently appeared in the excellent Promising Young Woman, delivering an outstanding performance that sadly was overlooked due to the career-defining performance by Carey Mulligan.