‘Big Shot’ – Hoops coach smartens up after being taken down a peg
A driven college basketball coach gets a lesson in humanity when he’s forced to head up a girls high-school team in a comedy/drama series upcoming on Disney+.
In “Big Shot,” premiering Friday, April 16, John Stamos (“Fuller House,” “ER”) is cast in the role of Marvyn Korn, whose quick temper got him ousted as coach of Wisconsin’s men’s hoops team after he threw a chair at a referee. To salvage his career and professional reputation, he takes a job at The Westbrook School for Girls, an elite private institution and a far cry from his days in the Big 10. But the gig also offers him the opportunity to step out of his comfort zone, re-examine his priorities and make changes for the better as he learns to work with a different kind of athlete – and they with him.
Created by David E. Kelley (“Big Little Lies,” “The Undoing”), Dean Lorey (“iZombie,” “Harley Quinn”) and Brad Garrett, the series also stars Jessalyn Gilsig (“Glee”) as assistant coach Holly Barrett and Yvette Nicole Brown (“Community) as school headmaster Sherilyn Thomas.
For Stamos, “Big Shot” entailed a major learning curve as he readily admits his lack of basketball knowledge coming in was almost comical.
“I sort of panicked when I heard it was about basketball,” he explains, “but I dug into that part of it as much as I could. I went to a rehearsal with (Los Angeles Lakers great) Jerry West. I guess they call it a practice, but I called it a rehearsal, and ... that was the first moment he gave me a dirty look. And then I thought that his team ... (was) the Clippers. I thought they were a college team, and that didn’t go over well.
“But I really took it as a challenge, honestly,” he continues, “because it was just such a character that I’ve never played and it was the first character that I’ve been offered that everybody is talking about him like how unlikable he is and what a crab he is and he’s not a nice person. So I dug into that.”