Steve Nash will produce Pete Maravich film, Brett Rapkin will write and direct

One incredible college and NBA shooter is producing a movie about another one. Steve Nash has long had a passion for film, even co-directing Into The Wind, a 30 for 30 documentary on Terry Fox, while still an active NBA player. Since his May retirement, he’s become even more involved in that world, producing an independent movie on the 1980s rise of ecstasy in Dallas. Now, The Wrap’s Jeff Sneider reports that Nash will be a producer on a new film about college and NBA legend “Pistol” Pete Maravich:

Emmy-nominated filmmaker Brett Rapkin has teamed up with eight-time NBA All-Star Steve Nash and his Meathawk Productions to fast-track a feature film detailing the brilliant yet tragic life and career of NBA Hall of Famer “Pistol” Pete Maravich, TheWrap has learned.

Rapkin recently optioned Maravich’s life rights from his estate under his Podium Pictures banner and has begun writing the screenplay. Nash will produce with Rob Goodrich, Ezra Holland and George Roy.

That’s quite a team. Rapkin has been involved in plenty of sports projects, including writing and directing the upcoming feature film Spaceman (starring Josh Duhamel as Bill Lee), directing documentaries on Lee, the ’67 Red Sox, the NFL draft, the Dodgers and more, and earning five Emmy nominations. Roy is a long-time vet of HBO Films and other places with 10 directing and 28 producing credits, and he directed a 2001 TV movie on Maravich (starring Harry Connick Jr., no less). Holland, Nash’s cousin who co-founded Meathawk Productions with him in 2008, co-directed Into The Wind, while Goodrich served as a producer on Spaceman and has numerous other credits. So, there’s substantial film experience here.

Maravich’s story should make for a great movie, too. His father, a famed coach in his own right, put plenty of pressure on Pete to succeed at a young age, and he managed to do it. He was incredible in college at LSU from 1967-70, playing on the team his father coached, and still holds the NCAA all-time scoring record with 3,667 points (44.2 per game) despite playing just three seasons (freshmen were ineligible for varsity then) and playing before the introduction of the three-point line or the shot clock. He helped take the Tigers from a 3-20 season before he arrived to an eventual fourth-place finish in the NIT in his senior year, and he then went on to an impressive NBA career, earning five all-star nods and two First-Team All-NBA selections in 11 seasons with the Atlanta Hawks, the New Orleans and then Utah Jazz and the Boston Celtics.

Maravich battled injuries, alcoholism and tragedy throughout his career, though, including his mother’s suicide. He had to retire at 33 thanks to knee injuries, and spent two years as a recluse, examining everything from yoga to Hinduism to ufology to vegetarianism to evangelical Christianity. He died at 40 from heart failure, which came on during a pickup basketball game. So, there’s lots of material to explore on that front too. It will be interesting to see what Rapkin, Nash, and their team do with this story, but having Nash produce a movie about Maravich (who he was often compared to, and who he cited as a big influence on his own game) certainly seems like a good pairing.

[The Wrap]