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First, Powell discussed the role of sports in movies and TV shows more broadly.
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“What I love about sports, film and and television shows, and why I think the ones that are successful really strike a chord is because there’s a really good balance of excellent character development and how the sports intersect with that,” she said. “I think you always see a really intersectional piece of media whenever sports are in television or film. I know there’s pushback when it comes to talking about sport and society, but it is sort of unavoidable in television and movies.”
Later, Leite and Powell discussed a new WNBA sitcom, The W, that will air on Peacock and is being developed with Chiney Ogwumike.
“I think it’s, one, it’s the right time for a women’s basketball centered sitcom,” Leite said. “And two, I just think, like this movement of women’s basketball that we’re seeing as a whole, like the Caitlin Clark the boom of the WNBA expansion, it would be a miss, if it that wasn’t leading to stories and sitcoms and media like this, like we need.”
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Added Powell: “You’re reminding me of a question that I have for Chiney and everyone who is working on this show, which is, what WNBA are they going to be portraying? And the reason what you said reminded me of this was because, as we know, the show is going to be based on when Chiney was drafted and chose Allison as her agent. So does that mean that story is happening at around the time Chiney was drafted, which was a little bit over 10 years ago, or is this story going to be taking place in the modern WNBA, which is, I mean, it’s almost a completely different league.”
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