Fresh off the back of HBO’s Winning Time’s release, DeVaughn Nixon is diving headfirst back into training for season 2. Such a quick turnaround between seasons is atypical; “Usually shows take like a year at least, from the season finale,” says Nixon. “But we’re just back on it.” Thanks to a pandemic delay—and a great reception—the show is back in full swing, ready to bring more mythologized basketball stories of a bygone era to life. And for that, Nixon is grateful: “I love it, because I have a job! I love to work,” he says earnestly. “I always like to stay busy, so I think I’m blessed in that way.”

Nixon is no stranger to hard work. As a child actor, he featured in the likes of The Bodyguard and Terminator 2. More recently, in addition to playing his father, Lakers (and Clippers) guard Norm Nixon, he’s appeared as Kane Hamilton in FX’s Snowfall.

Flaunt caught up with the actor in the wake of the final Winning Time episode airing to chat about the Lakers’ Showtime era, Winning Time as a love letter, and what’s to come.

The last episode came out on Sunday. How are you feeling now that the full series is finally out in the world?

I feel great. I feel like we have a great project on our hands. I think that people’s biggest critique was that the beginning moved slow. But it was story development. So as they got deeper into it, people were like ‘oh man, I wanna see them play basketball’—then boom, Episode 4, when we started training camp. So I think people were like, ‘oh, the basketball’s done cool, we want to see more.’ You know, it was a slow burn, but I think people now respect it and see the greatness in the project that we have on our hands.

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Definitely. Before getting more into the show I wanted to get your perspective on the Laker’s Showtime era. What was it about that team, at that time, that beckoned the making of a show like this?

That team is special because, first of all, Los Angeles. LA. People all across the entire world want to come to LA, or want to come to New York or Miami. So we’re one of those three, first. Second, we have film out here. We have celebrities. So that’s what I think that era was kind of—it was complementary to what we were building. Because you have this sports team that wasn’t necessarily good that past eight years since Jerry West was on there. And now you have this phenomenon, Magic Johnson and all of these kids who attract the media. And I feel like we started the media, we started the celebrities, people sitting courtside, people didn’t do that. The form of entertainment in the Laker girls. So it was like a party, rather than just go listen to music, eat popcorn, and go home. I feel like it was more of an experience. And that’s where I feel the genius in Dr. Jerry Buss was found, because he created that, I believe.

That links into something I was going to ask you about—I was curious to hear what you thought the value was in telling this story in the form of a scripted series versus a more traditional documentary-style show (thinking specifically about the kind of time-hopping, talking heads, old footage sort of thing like The Last Dance, which blew up during the pandemic). This is quite a different approach—one which is more entertainment-geared, I would say.

Yeah, I feel like, back to what we were saying, the Los Angeles Lakers, it was Showtime. So it’s such a cool story to tell, I think HBO makes premiere television, you know, the production value, the way things are shot, and the actors and the audiences that they attract. I feel like they just saw the value in this. Once they got the book and saw everything and all the pieces—it was a challenge for them too, because think about it: how are you gonna cast Magic Johnson? How are you gonna find all these people that can act? So I feel like they took it on as a challenge, versus the documentary, as they could’ve gone that route. And you know, we knew that there was gonna probably be a documentary about the Lakers. Just because The Last Dance went so well, like you said, over the pandemic. So we knew people saw that idea, and were like, ‘oh, ok.’

People like documentaries. I can speak for myself, I do. It’s factual—but also it depends on who's telling the documentary. Because it’s from their side. So what about all the people that didn’t get a chance [to speak]? Like Michael Jordan, you know—it’s from his perspective. So I think making a television show, it’s like, whatever, we’re gonna dramatize this, we’re just gonna make it fun, we’re gonna make it spectacular. Whoever watches it, watches it. I think it’s more fun.

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Off of that, I wanted to ask you about striking that balance between truth and fiction. I know your father has said in an interview that the one-on-one game was made up for the show. And I suppose that’s something you also have to reconcile in the character; the pieces that are true to your father, and what’s dramatized. How do you find that sweet spot between reality and fantasy in a project like this?

I look at posture. I look at people’s posture, their cadence, the way they speak. Like my dad’s from Georgia, he has a different dialect. So I’m not DeVaughn. I’m my father. So that’s the truth I try to give him, in terms of physicality, working out like a monster every single day. Just trying to get into the shape of being an NBA player, and the truth to that, trying to do my own stunts, mimicking his shot.

But in terms of the writing and how I navigated that, I talked to my dad. And he was like, ‘This is television, I know,’ but I just wanted to bring him a little bit of truth, to his style, to his movement. And they dressed him how he dressed. You know, he was kind of a lowkey fashion icon, I wanna say! My stepmother would go out and my dad would have a cutoff tan vest—I was like, wow, he was really going for it! And I can show you this picture—he always says he never wore this coat. I think that’s a lie. So for me, I just wanted to be truthful to who he was physically, and in terms of his personality.

Now his personality I played with a little bit. Because for me, he was one of those unsung heroes that didn’t get as much respect as all the other players, even though they were all integral pieces to the entire process and the game. So that’s why I literally turned it up. Because I wanted people to be like, ‘oh, my gosh, Norm Nixon, okay!’ I wanted his name to be spoken amongst all these legends as well. Because if you don’t know basketball, you might not know who this Norm guy is. But now hopefully the world will.

I imagine it wasn’t your typical research process, given that not only are you playing someone who you know, but someone in your family; someone who raised you. How did you go about researching and preparing to play that part of your own father?

It brought me back to being a fan. So I did everything that I would think that somebody who saw the show would do. I Googled him. I read his Wikipedia. There were some things I found out that I actually didn’t know. Like I didn’t know that when he got traded to the Clippers the first year, he led the league in assists. I didn’t know that. I found out that he was the only All Star on both the Lakers and the Clippers—the only player, like ever. So there were little things I picked up, but for the most part I already knew. What I really did was I went back and watched old footage. I have one of his NBA tapes here that I made into a little zip; I would watch that, watch some of his interviews, just to know his cadence.

Then I coupled that with me already knowing who my dad was. A guy who likes to listen to jazz. A guy who likes to read. A guy who plays the piano by ear and just figures out chords. So all of that went into the process. The challenging part was the physical part. Because I weighed about 185—I lost about 30 pounds to get into shape with the fasting and everything. But equally were as challenging, I would say.

It sounds like the prep you did was extensive, and that’s a more-than-is-typical amount of time to spend with one’s father’s character—I’m talking character in the sense of the person, rather than the role. Has that helped you get to know your father better, or differently, than before you delved into the part?

It definitely brought us a lot closer. Because I would ask him questions. And he’s like, you playing me right? So why don’t you go do your research?’ And I’m like, dude, you are my research! You’re right there, what are you talking about!? So you know, a lot more phone calls. I would call him before a scene sometimes. I’d be like, how were you feeling going into this? And he’s like, ‘DeVaughn, I don’t even remember man.’ He was just like, ‘Just go and act. Stop bothering me.’ So there was this playful banter back and forth.

We talk a lot more, we hang out a lot more. He was just up here doing an after game special, with him, Michael Cooper, Rob Fogasachi, we had a lunch. Something we typically wouldn’t do. ‘Cause he’s always over on his side—they live over on the Westside—but yeah, it’s been good. And I really appreciated getting to know him a lot better.

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You’ve described the show as a love letter to the Lakers. Could you speak a little more about that characterization?

I love them. I inherently love them. It’s in my blood, it’s in my lineage. Adam McKay is a huge basketball fan. I’ll never forget this—I went down to the office and I go into the bathroom, and he has all of these cards laminated all over his walls, like he knows every fact, everything. I believe Max Warnstein is a lover of the sport as well. We all grew up on this. All of these guys were our heroes. I was a little bit younger, but I feel like that era was a lot more interesting. ‘Cause people didn’t have Twitter, Snapchat, as now to expose how flashy it is. Back then, people—that’s why The Last Dance was so cool, because you didn’t get all that footage. Now we have the ability to go back, grab the footage, and share it with the world.

So with that said, I think that’s why we love that era. That’s why it was made. There’s so much stuff to tell. The story of Spencer Hayward—how he was the first person to get everybody to be drafted out of high school. LeBron James, Kevin Garnett, people like that have him to thank. There’s so much admiration. So much admiration for me, playing my father, getting to know him. That’s why I think it’s a love letter.

And nobody has any malicious intent. It’s just like, you know, it’s definitely fictionalized, but I wouldn’t probably like it if somebody was writing a story about my life. I’d be like, what are you gonna say? This, that, and the other. I don’t need to be bothered by this. But there’s no malicious intent, we’re just all fans, we all love this sport, and we all love the Lakers. So that’s why it’s a love letter.

I do think there’s such a fascination with that era, particularly because we do only get to see little snippets until a show like this opens that door. Otherwise it’s just paparazzi photos, a story here and a story there.

And it’s informational. We should have stories about these things, about how these people came to be. I didn’t know all that stuff about Jerry Buss, that he had no money and had to borrow from his wife. I didn’t know any of that. And that’s why I think people were hooked. They were like, ‘wow, okay, cool.’ We just couldn’t wait to tell the stories.

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What’s been your favorite reaction you’ve seen to the show?

Oh, when coach Mckinney falls off his bike—I watched it with a couple of people randomly in a bar, just low key. Literally, when he hit his bike, everybody was like ‘oooh!’ and even I was like ‘oooh!’ I didn’t know it was gonna be that gross. You felt like you could hear his bones scraping against the concrete. And I love horror movies! But I felt that one.

And then people always ask me about the one-on-one scene. They’re like, did that really happen? Did you do that? And I feel like that was a cool moment for me because a lot of people remember that moment because it was the first episode. So that was cool for me. And now if I get recognized and somebody comes up to me, they’ll be like, ‘in that fur coat. You were in that fur coat.’ So that’s cool for me to experience people recognizing the work that all of us put in, and my work specifically for playing my father. So that was cool. That was a reaction I really enjoyed.

Are you finding you get recognized more now? You’ve obviously been in the industry for ages.

Yeah. It’s a weird thing. But I did a show called Snowfall as well that aired at the same time. And it was both. At the time, they were so deep into Snowfall, so I’d get noticed from that. I played a character named Kane. And I came in on that season super strong, I think impressed people. I think I impressed my family. My wife, she liked it as well, and she’s a very harsh critic. And I hate watching myself. But it’s a cool feeling—you feel like you did a little something to make people smile. Or evoke a feeling out of a person. That’s why I like it. But it’s not all about that! I just wanna work. But it’s a cool part of the process, of getting to where you wanna get.

Yeah, take the victory! In terms of, like you said, wanting to work—where do you go from here? You’ve got Season 2 lined up, but what kinds of other roles do you think you’ll seek out in the future?

I just want to be very specific with my next role. Because both roles that I’m playing right now are complete stretches. I’m playing my dad, this energetic, flamboyant character. Then I’m playing a thug, who is getting revenge for his family being killed. They’re two opposite ends of the spectrum, so I wanna find something—I just wanna play something different from everything I’ve done in my previous jobs. And I don’t want it to be easy. I want a challenge, whether it be—I don’t even know. I just want it to be a challenge, and I want it to constantly be something different where I can be a chameleon. Because I think that’s what actors are: people who don’t fall into the same role because it’s easy; they always want to do something that’s like, ‘damn, well, can I do this? This is scary.’ So that’s how I want to feel in my next project.

I would love to do a war movie though. I’ve never done a war movie, but would love to do something like that. Because I would dive deep into it with the training, understanding the story, hang out with the marines, or do something like that.

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