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'On a lighter note, I'm going to review this documentary I'm doing with Spike Lee tonight after the game and I didn't feel like sitting next to him and hearing him talking trash about the Knicks, so that was added incentive as well. But Kobe said he made a point to make sure not to lose the game or he would hear it from me.' Bryant indeed said in an after game interview that he was going to give the game his all in order to show Spike Lee a thing or two about Bryant's skills on the court against the Knicks. 'I know that if he had a terrible game the commentary would not have been the same. Spike Lee said that he was excited for Bryant to do the commentary following a game at Madison Square Garden, but no one expected a 61-point performance from Bryant. Bryant provided the voice-over for the documentary on February 2, 2009, hours after he scored 61 points against the New York Knicks at Madison Square Garden, (then a single-game record at the arena, which has been broken since).

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The cameras also get full access of coach Phil Jackson in the locker room with the team during half-time. The documentary also focuses on Bryant and the team in huddles and during time-outs. The 84-minute documentary ran on ESPN commercial free. But I don't think I was taking a gamble by choosing Kobe.' Also, according to Spike Lee, 'He (Kobe) said several times how much fun it was just doing it.' Also the Lakers looked like they were going to take it to the Finals. He was having an MVP-type year, in which he did win the MVP. In an NBA.com 2009 Q&A (now archived) Spike Lee explained in an interview why he chose Kobe Bryant as the subject for this documentary: 'I'm a big basketball fan. The game was a crucial game in the end of the regular season, as the Los Angeles Lakers hoped to keep first place in the Western Conference with a record of 55-25. īryant shot 6 of 14 from the field, scored 20 points, and played 32 minutes. Lee uses multiple cameras, sound from the in-game broadcast, the Staples Center, a microphone worn by Kobe himself, and a follow-up narration while he watched the footage to illustrate every detail of Kobe's performance, strategy, and inner thoughts. Kobe Doin’ Work is an 84-minute exploration of Kobe Bryant's work ethic, his in game mentality, and the bluntness that made Bryant a great competitor. Kobe: Doin' Work premiered on ESPN on May 16, 2009. Lee's cameras were also given unprecedented access to the Laker locker room. Bryant agreed to wear a microphone throughout the day capturing in-game, bench, and locker room conversations. Bryant granted filmmaker Spike Lee and 30 cameras total access to his life for one day.

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It focuses on then professional basketball player Kobe Bryant before, during, and immediately after one game of the 2007–08 Los Angeles Lakers season against the San Antonio Spurs. His other films include Red Hook Summer (2012), Old Boy (2013, a remake of the Chan-wook Park 2003 film) and BlackKklansman (2018, starring John David Washington).Kobe Doin' Work is a 2009 documentary film directed by Spike Lee. Spike Lee has often appeared in his own films, and his own She's Gotta Have It character Mars Blackmon, a sports-loving New York nebbish, has appeared in Nike athletic gear commercials.

Lee and Denzel Washington reunited for the mainstream heist thriller Inside Man in 2006.

In his later films he continued to tell stories with racial themes and New York settings, including the Brooklyn drama Do the Right Thing (1989), the jazz-tinged Mo' Better Blues (1990, with Denzel Washington and Wesley Snipes), the interracial romance Jungle Fever (1993, with Snipes and Anabella Sciorra), the biopic Malcolm X (1992, starring Washington and based in part on the book by Malcolm X and Alex Haley), Summer of Sam (1999, with John Leguizamo), and the controversial racial satire Bamboozled (2000, with Mos Def). The film established Spike Lee as a rising black filmmaker (something of a rarity at the time) and his skills and independence, along with his outspoken African-American perspective and feisty public persona, kept him in the public eye into the next century. Name at birth: Shelton Jackson LeeSpike Lee made a name for himself in 1986 with the hit independent film She's Gotta Have It, a frank comedy about the many lovers of an independent Brooklyn woman.