Based on the unscientific metric of audience laugh rate during a well-attended Sunday matinee, LeBron James is the funniest person in "Trainwreck," a movie written by and starring one culture-certified comedy genius, Amy Schumer, directed by another, Judd Apatow, and featuring the likes of Bill Hader, Colin Quinn, Dave Attell, Vanessa Bayer, and Mike Birbiglia. This is, depending on how you look at it, either a happy revelation of James's diverse talents or an unfortunate detail about the movie to which he lends them. 
 
 But let's stick to the good news: James, playing a gently bizarro version of himself, steals the show. He is the best friend of Schumer's love interest, a sports surgeon named Aaron Conners (Hader), and serves as the wary gatekeeper of his friend's fragile heart. This familiar rom-com role often produces reliable laughs, but it is normally played by a quirky comedic actress in pajamas, rather than by the best basketball player on the planet—and so the initial joy of watching James onscreen likely owes to the relief of discovering that he is not as terrible as he had every right to be. But that low bar is cleared quickly, during his first scene, after he nails a bit about being so cheap that he'd drive forty minutes out of his way to retrieve a pair of thirty-dollar sunglasses. 
 
 From there on—as he haggles over an itemized brunch bill, refers to sex as “making love,” sings the praises of Cuyahoga sunsets, and offers dating advice in the form of a spoken-word monologue of Kanye West's “Gold Digger”—it becomes clear that James has delivered something more than just a passably good cameo. He plays himself as at once artless and knowing, cheerfully sentimental but with a mean streak when it comes to protecting his buddy. In a requisite scene of one-on-one with Conners, he forgets to go easy and innocently bullies his feeble opponent all over the court. Was I the only one who, at some point, wanted the camera to leave the movie stars for a while and see what this LeBron character was getting up to on his own? 
 
 Maybe I am still in the thrall of watching James grill Schumer about her intentions with his friend—“When you look at the clouds, do you see his face?”—but it seems safe to declare that he has given the greatest motion-picture acting performance by an active professional basketball player of all time. This may sound like especially narrow praise, but that category includes plenty of hall-of-famers. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's performance in “Airplane!,” as the co-pilot Roger Murdock, looms large (“The hell I don't!”), but, looking at it again, Abdul-Jabbar appears a bit more stilted than I remembered. Ray Allen was credible as a high-school phenom in Spike Lee's “He Got Game,” playing opposite Denzel Washington, but the role's lasting impact owes more to the character's cool name, Jesus Shuttlesworth, than it does to Allen's acting chops. The various onscreen performances of funny-in-real-life Shaquille O'Neal, meanwhile, are mostly beneath mention, though other players who get scripts sent their way would be wise to recall his disastrous turn as a rhyming genie in the movie “Kazaam.” Last week, Charles Barkley aimed a little shade at James, saying, “LeBron should call this ‘Trainwreck 2,’ cause the Finals were ‘Trainwreck 1.’ ” But perhaps he was just worried that James had eclipsed his own dramatic exploits. 
 
 LeBron's most serious historical competition comes, as it always does, from Michael Jordan, and his starring turn in the partially animated Warner Brothers corporate bonanza “Space Jam,” from 1996. Amid rampant product placement, Jordan gives a charming and self-effacing performance, full of shrugs and smirks, all while acting in front of a green screen among cartoon characters that weren't in the room. Such conditions have gotten the better of many professional actors, yet Jordan made it through without looking any more ridiculous than he was supposed to. James had the benefit of working with living, breathing, funny humans, and with a script that let him be a silly version of his real self—but even so, it is a pleasant surprise to see James, who is sometimes referred to as a kind of charmless basketball cyborg, display some Jordan-level charisma. Enjoy it while it lasts, though, because James might just have been too good in “Trainwreck” for his, and our, own good. The offers will be coming in. Most of them will be terrible. Hopefully no one will ask him to play a genie. But what about “Space Jam 2”? 
 
 James, meanwhile, is not the only athlete to show up in “Trainwreck,” and the presence of Amar'e Stoudemire, Chris Evert, and Tony Romo only serves as more evidence of his better-than-expected performance. Reviewing the movie in the magazine, Anthony Lane points out that, after a while, “the namechecks become an embarrassment.” These cameos indeed seem mostly to be about the filmmakers’ industry juice, and a clear signal of the movie's aim for mass appeal. But the presence of these real sports people isn't entirely out of place, since sports themselves occupy a surprisingly important, and even heroic, role in the movie, which is odd, since Schumer, who wrote it, and Apatow, who directed it, both claim to hate sports. 
 
 But consider the plot: it begins with Schumer's character, Amy Townsend, in an editorial meeting at the men's magazine where she works, delivering a speech in which she says that sports are infantile and uninteresting, a blight on the American landscape—and that the people who like them, especially the men who like them, are boring and terrible. This is a fair social critique—sports as a domineering force, an expensive entertainment masquerading as culture. Then she meets Aaron Conners, the sports doctor whom she is assigned to profile. She admits to knowing nothing about the players he repairs—after claiming, for a moment, to root for the Long Island Mediums and the Orlando Blooms. Conners, of course, loves sports, arguing that they are an important source of community, that they bring people together. This disagreement is the proxy for the chasm between the characters that must be crossed. Something's gotta give. 
 
 And it isn't going to be sports. In a battle between love and basketball, even in a movie by sports skeptics, basketball wins. In Schumer's telling, a woman must come around to the joys of the game in order to fit in, and prove her fitness to a man. This isn't “Bull Durham,” in which a love of sports can be a language that both men and women might equally share. Instead, it's more like “Fever Pitch,” in which Drew Barrymore had to become a Red Sox fan to truly understand Jimmy Fallon. “Trainwreck” ends with a triumphant scene at Madison Square Garden, the only time in recent memory when something good has happened at a Knicks game. LeBron James is gone by then, but it was his world that brought everyone together. ||||| Skip in Skip x Embed x Share NBA star LeBron James' recently announced partnership with Warner Bros. stoked rumors that a "Space Jam" sequel could be on the horizon. Video provided by Newsy Newslook 
 
 LeBron James and wife Savannah Brinson at the 'Trainwreck' premiere on July 14. (Photo: Andrew Toth, FilmMagic) 
 
 LeBron James is going Hollywood. 
 
 After stealing critics' hearts in the Amy Schumer summer comedy, Trainwreck, the NBA star is plotting more projects for big and small screens. 
 
 On Wednesday, Warner Bros. announced a partnership with James' company, SpringHill Entertainment, in what they called "an unprecedented agreement." The deal includes projects for television, film and original digital content. 
 
 "LeBron James has one of the most powerful, well-known brands in the world and we are excited to be in business with him and his partner, Maverick Carter, and SpringHill Entertainment," said Warner Bros. chairman Kevin Tsujihara in a statement. "The combination of LeBron's global media presence and Warner Bros.' unmatched production and distribution expertise is a big win for fans everywhere." 
 
 Said the Cleveland Cavaliers star: "Connecting with my fans and telling meaningful stories have always been my passion. In everything I've done, from Nike commercials to Uninterrupted and (Starz scripted comedy) Survivor's Remorse, it's always about connecting with people of all ages and providing unique content they can all enjoy." 
 
 What did the critics have to say about his first major movie star role? USA TODAY called his performance "a slam dunk." The New Yorker called James "the funniest person" in the whole dang thing. 
 
 NPR gave him major kudos, writing that "this isn't really a cameo; it's a bona fide supporting performance in a comedy, and he's straight-up terrific." And the Los Angeles Times said the NBA star's' "performance reflects impressive off-court timing and a sense of humor about his own image." 
 
 Here's to more of that, Warner Bros.-style. ||||| Basketball superstar LeBron James is widely referred to as King James. On Wednesday, he extended his realm to entertainment. 
 
 James' entertainment company Springhill announced a production partnership with Warner Bros. to produce content for television, film and digital platforms. 
 
 Word of the deal immediately sparked speculation that it could mean that "Space Jam 2" could be in the works. The original 1996 "Space Jam," starring Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny, still has a cult-like following. A Warner Bros. spokesperson, however, had no comment. 
 
 It won't be his first entertainment venture -- he currently stars in the movie "Trainwreck." He had founded the SpringHill Entertainment company in 2013 with a business partner. 
 
 In announcing the deal, James said that "telling meaningful stories have always been my passion." 
 
 Related: LeBron tickets soar to nearly $1,000 
 
 "In everything I've done, from Nike (NKE) commercials to 'Uninterrupted' and 'Survivor's Remorse,' it's always about connecting with people of all ages and providing unique content they can all enjoy," he said. 
 
 "Uninterrupted" is a video series on athletes' stories for the online site Bleacher Report, which like CNNMoney and Warner Bros, is owned by Time Warner (TWX). "Survivor's Remorse" is a comedy for the Starz channel about a young basketball player in the NBA. 
 
 Details of the arrangement were not released. 
 
 Related: LeBron's road to becoming a billionaire
– If you liked LeBron James in the new Amy Schumer film—critics did—get ready for much more. The NBA star has signed a deal with Warner Bros. that includes movies, TV, and digital content, reports USA Today. The deal with James' production company, SpringHill Entertainment, led to speculation that a sequel to Space Jam—the 1996 cult favorite with Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny—might be in the works, notes CNNMoney. If so, the studio wasn't saying. Details on the deal weren't announced.