2 l April
17 - 23, 2022
Northeast Oregon TV Weekly
BY JAY BOBBIN
Magic Johnson tells his own story in
Apple TV+ documentary series
The Magic Johnson
biography “They Call Me
Magic” begins streaming
Friday on Apple TV+.
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Over 60-plus years, through personal
and professional triumphs and setbacks, his
life has been Magic. And often very public.
With contributions from relatives and
friends, Earvin “Magic” Johnson tells his
story in “They Call Me Magic,” a four-
part Apple TV+ documentary series that
begins streaming Friday, April 22. The
program traces his legendary, numerous-
record-setting career with basketball’s Los
Angeles Lakers, which saw him retire upon
disclosing his HIV-positive diagnosis,
but he returned to the team later as a
coach and then as a player again – and
then as the Lakers’ president of basketball
operations.
“People had come to me before and
wanted to do something,” Johnson says of
making the profile, “but I felt the timing
wasn’t right. Then (the ESPN/Netflix
documentary) ‘The Last Dance’ happened
and everybody just said, ‘Hey, you’ve got
to do yours.’ And I was ready for it. I got a
great partner in Apple. I think that this is
an amazing journey that I’ve been on, and
we’re going to tell that story.”
Johnson also has made marks as a media
personality and a business entrepreneur,
the latter making him an owner of the
Los Angeles Dodgers, an insurance
company and the cable network Aspire.
He believes he shows other athletes how
to “reinvent yourself,” reasoning that “if
you can remember all those plays ... you’re
smart enough to really go into being a
businessman or a businesswoman.”
However, Johnson accepts his health also
is a major part of his history. He reflects,
“What I tried to do is ask my doctors,
‘What do I have to do to be able to live for
a long time?’ Everything that they told me
– take my meds, have a positive attitude,
work out – I did those things. And then, (I
also had to) be comfortable with my new
status. I think that was the main thing.
I was giving up the game that I love in
basketball, and that was hard for me to do.
“I think at the end of the day, I’ve
done everything the right way. The most
important thing, why I’m probably still
here, is because of my support system: my
wife, Cookie, my kids, my parents, my
brothers and sisters.
Still, Johnson notes that in reviewing his
life as “They Call Me Magic” was being
made, “You always look at it differently.
I mean, I’ve lived it. Whether that was
winning championships or crying when
(former Lakers owner) Dr. Jerry Buss was
dying, whether it was announcing HIV,
whether that’s when I opened movie
theaters in the Black community – it
brought back some incredible memories
for me to do this documentary. And I’m so
proud of it.”
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