\u201cBlack Rabbit,\u201d<\/a> a Jude Law\/Justin Bateman vehicle centered on a hip New York restaurant.<\/p>\nThe two stars play brothers, Jake and Vince Friedken. Law\u2019s Jake is a rising star in the hospitality business and Bateman\u2019s Vince a degenerate gambler. Weber\u2019s Junior Mancuso plays a hitman who\u2019s trying to get Bateman to pay off gambling debts he owes Mancuso\u2019s mob boss father, played by Oscar winner Troy Kutser. It\u2019s a star-studded cast and Laura Linney, Bateman\u2019s co-star in \u201cOzarks,\u201c directed several of the episodes.<\/p>\n
Despite that success and two subsequent movie roles, Weber is sticking around HSS Training Center and Barclays Center. He\u2019s been in the NBA since joining the Spurs in his native San Antonio as a teenager. Indeed when his agent suggested he could now concentrate on acting, Weber said no. \u201cI like my day job.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a juggling act for my whole career,\u201d Weber told The Post in an exclusive interview. \u201cLuckily for me, when I was hired by the Brooklyn Nets \u2026 and I was speaking to them about chasing these acting dreams and I said that\u2019ll always come first for me \u2014 that that\u2019s my main passion and drive in life \u2014 they were incredibly understanding.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve been malleable and flexible and supportive of my acting career,\u201d Weber said of the ensuing decade. \u201cSo any time I\u2019ve got a random gig that takes me to Chicago or Utah or South Dakota or any of the places I\u2019ve filmed and I tell them I need a few weeks off, they\u2019ve been very cool about it. I consider myself very lucky to be able to bounce back and forth between the two biggest passions in my life, sports and acting.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, of course, things have changed. He has had small roles in \u201cLaw & Order,\u201d \u201cThe Blacklist,\u201d \u201cGotham\u201d and \u201cThe Knick\u201d and received New York Innovative Theatre Award nomination for his work in \u201cPlan G.\u201d But now, he\u2019s established and \u201cBlack Rabbit\u201d is garnering Emmy buzz.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s definitely changed my day-to-day. \u201d Weber, 36, said. \u201cA Celtics player (Josh Minott) asked for a photo with me on the court after the game. That\u2019s been fun seeing the NBA players\u2019 reactions as they come into town and piece it together. It\u2019s been life-changing, for sure. It\u2019s led to two feature films that I\u2019ve filmed already that were only made because of \u2018Black Rabbit.\u2019 \u2026 I\u2019m taking a few selfies every day with people on the street that recognize me from the show. So I\u2019m definitely grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201cjuggling,\u201d as Weber describes it, has led to some interesting intersections between the jobs. For example, early in the series, Law\u2019s character takes his son to Barclays Center for a game, his son dressed in a Nets\u2019 jersey. He even says, \u201cWe love the Nets.\u201d Casual viewers might have seen that and knowing Weber\u2019s connection thought producers had chosen Barclays instead of, say, Madison Square Garden. Not so.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I saw what was happening, I told a few people at Barclays, \u2018I hear there\u2019s a show filming here Monday,\u2019 and they were like, \u2018Yeah. How do you know about that?\u2019 I was like, \u2018Well, I\u2019m in the show,\u2019\u201d Weber told Lewis. \u201cI don\u2019t think anyone realized how big it was. They know I\u2019ve done little things here and there. I don\u2019t think anyone realized how crazy that moment was except for me.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut yeah, in hindsight, now everyone\u2019s been like, \u2018Wow, that was crazy. What are the odds that you ended up filming at Barclays?\u2019 Between that and the character knowing ASL (American Sign Language,) it was really one of those meant-to-be things.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weber\u2019s big scene is when Junior Mancuso tries to convince his father to let him kill Vince Friedkin, Bateman\u2019s character. Kotsur, the actor who plays the mob boss, is deaf as is his character. Weber, as it turns out, is fluent in sign language (ASL.) Weber\u2019s sister Crystal uses it to communicate with family members and Weber\u2019s mother uses ASL professionally. The sign language adds to the scene\u2019s authenticity.<\/p>\n
[Crystal] has been one of my biggest supporters from afar, for sure. It\u2019s been really lovely,\u201d Weber said. \u201cMost of my family binged [the show] the night it came out. And both my mom, who is a sign language interpreter, as well as my sister were both very helpful any time I had a question in terms of ASL, dialect or tendencies.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was also one of those moments when Weber understood that, yes, he had arrived.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose scenes in that basement \u2026 That was super-special, just because of how full circle that moment felt getting to use ASL,\u201d Weber said. \u201cActing with some of the biggest names in the industry, that was a \u2018pinch me\u2019 moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
And just as the Nets weren\u2019t aware of his role, Bateman and Law didn\u2019t know about his Nets connection until he told them. Nets fans in the know also enjoyed how Bateman\u2019s character lost all that money betting on the Knicks. At one point, Law\u2019s character realizes the extent of his brother\u2019s gambling and exclaims \u201cyou all of Mom\u2019s money on the Knicks,\u201c to which Bateman\u2019s character notes with disgust and an expletive that it was Julius Randle\u2019s fault. (Some Nets fans may have been able to stifle a laughing fit. Not this one.)<\/p>\n
Weber also admitted to Lewis how he was able to get Nic Claxton some notoriety.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we are on set in the [Kotsur character\u2019s basement] \u2026 obviously he\u2019s running an illegal gambling operation,\u201d Weber said. \u201cThere were player names up and down the board that our designers and production crew had decorated, and there weren\u2019t any Nets players listed. So I said, \u2018Hey, any chance we can slip a little Easter egg in here for my boy Nic Claxton and get his name on the board?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Weber is also not reluctant to express support for his team and his bosses, engaging in some back-and-forth with our Anthony Puccio a few months back, saying of the Knicks trade in June 2024, \u201c[Sean] Marks ran a master class on the Bridges trade\u201d and at another point noting, \u201cSean and Jordy are incredible leaders. I get what it looks like, but only time will tell, my friend.\u201d<\/p>\n
For the moment, at least, Weber is still working with the equipment crew, happy to continue as a Nets employee AND an actor. He even notes that there have been moments where the two overlapped. The Nets may not have known about his \u201cBlack Rabbit\u201d role but since he joined them in 2014, they\u2019ve known about his acting jones.<\/p>\n
He recalled how once they were shorthanded on a West Coast trip and Weber happened to be filming a pilot in Los Angeles so he pulled double duty going to then-Staples Center.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were definitely some crazy days where I was spending eight or 10 hours at one location filming, and then doing another eight or 10 at the arena,\u201d Weber said. \u201cIt\u2019s been a juggling act for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
But better juggling than struggling.<\/p>\n
Meet the longtime Nets staffer who\u2019s also stealing scenes as a Hollywood actor<\/a> ($) – Brian Lewis – New York Post<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The struggling actor is a quintessential American hero, living and dying for his or her art and the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,11879,9,24,63],"class_list":{"0":"post-52610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brooklyn","8":"tag-brooklyn","9":"tag-brooklyn-headlines","10":"tag-brooklyn-news","11":"tag-nets-features","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-nyc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}