When Love and basketball director Gina Prince-Bythewood shouted “action” as she shot the final scene for the 2000 cult classic, actress Sanaa Lathan had just one chance to get it right on the basketball court.
In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, the star The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat reveals that she got “one move” to shoot the final scene of the romantic sports comedy, in which her character, Monica Wright-McCall, takes the court at a WNBA game as a player for the Los Angeles Sparks.
The scene takes place after Monica marries Omar Epps’ character, Quincy McCall, and the two have a baby girl together.
“When we shot the last shot where Monica is at the actual game at the end of the movie where Quincy and her daughter are sitting courtside, it was an actual LA Sparks game,” Lathan, 52, recalls.
“We had one take,” she remembers of a scene that featured Sparks player Lisa Leslie as her teammate and Lakers legend Magic Johnson as a fan.
‘Love & Basketball’ director Gina Prince-Bythewood with Sanaa Lathan in 1999.
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“I was so nervous because they let us get the right stadium and the right players. One try, because it was in the middle of the actual game,” explained Lathan, who wore a No. 32 Sparks jersey with Wright-McCall emblazoned on it as the announcer introduced her to the game on screen.
Prince-Bythewood, 55, recently reunited with Lathan when she invited her to an Aug. 15 WNBA game between the Sparks and the New York Liberty.
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Love and Basketball director Gina Prince-Bythewood with Sanaa Lathan in 2000.
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The reunion happened 25 years after filming their WNBA scene for Love and basketballwhich has achieved several milestones in recent years.
In 2021 Love and basketball it was added to the Criterion Collection, and in 2023 the film was selected for the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry for its “cultural” and “aesthetic significance.”
For her Love and basketball Lathan won Best Actress at the BET Awards and NAACP Image Awards in 2001. Since then, the actress received a Tony nomination in 2004 for her role in Raisins in the sun and received an Emmy Award in 2022 for her guest role on HBO Succession.
Lathan made her directorial debut On Come Up in 2022
Now she’s acting The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat — alongside Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor and Uz Aduba — airing on Hulu.
Categories: Trends
Source: HIS Education