Stephen Curry’s Documentary Director Compares Working With Steph, Kobe Bryant And Tom Brady

It would seem more poetic for Stephen Curry’s latest documentary to focus on a game in which the Golden State Warriors’ star makes nearly shot he attempts, no matter the distance. But documentaries cannot be scripted.

Instead, “Portrait of an Artist: Stephen Curry” zeroes in on the NBA’s best shooter making his 4,000th career 3-pointer in a game that he mostly struggled. In the Warriors’ 130-104 win over the Sacramento Kings on March 13, 2025, Curry scored only 11 points while shooting 4-for-9 from the field and 2-for-6 from deep. He didn’t make his 4,000 career 3 until he made one with 8:19 left in the third quarter on a broken play.

The moment may not represent Curry at his best while he won four NBA championships in six Finals appearances. But it captures how Curry has often managed swarming defenses after spending the beginning of his career navigating doubts about his trajectory and durability. “Portrait of an Artist: Stephen Curry” will open exclusively in IMAX theaters on Oct. 9, giving fans a wide screen to marvel over both Curry’s breathless shots and his enduring grind.

Following a recent screening in Los Angeles, director Gotham Chopra spoke with Fadeaway World about his latest project after also working with Curry on other projects with an Under Armour commercial after breaking Ray Allen’s 3-point record (2022) and on a Facebook series that followed him throughout the 2018-19 season. Chopra provided perspective on what it was like to work with Curry compared to former NFL quarterback Tom Brady (“Tom vs. Time”) and to the late Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant (“Muse”).

Editor’s note: The following one-on-one interview has been edited and condensed.

This was your fourth project with Steph?

Chopra: “We’ve done four projects, but we’ve released three of them. The fourth one, we’re still trying to figure out. There was ‘Steph vs. The Game,’ which was on Facebook and followed him in the 2018-19 season through the Raptors loss in the Finals. I also did commercial work with him for Under Armour when he broke the [3-point] record in New York. And then this. We have another project that we’re talking about, so I count that as the fourth one.”

Can you share anything about that?

Chopra: “No, I don’t know if it will happen yet.”

How do you compare the experience of this third project with the other two?

Chopra: “When I started working with him on the Facebook series, of course, I knew of him. I was a big basketball fan. But we just plunged into that thing. It stretched across the season. So I got to know him really well, Ayesha and his parents. That was really important. We definitely built a trust. That was across a whole basketball season. We weren’t there for every single day, but we were there for the important games. I got to know the Warriors really well. I got to know Steve [Kerr] because you obviously have to navigate around that with access. So that’s what really built the relationship. I take pride in that. I worked with Tom Brady a bunch. I worked with Steph now multiple times on different projects. And I’ve maintained those relationships. Kobe was the only one that was one-and-done for both of us. I had kept in touch with Kobe. But afterwards, we both were like, ‘No.’”

You guys wore each other out?

Chopra: “Yeah. You know he was singular in terms of his personality. But I had stayed in touch with Steph. Chris Stone was here [at the screening]. He used to be his guy at Under Armour. So for a long time, Under Armour was a big part of his life so you had to navigate that. So I had kept in touch. Then they brought me on to do the project when he broke the record at MSG. It had to be a quick turnaround. They said, ‘We just needed someone that he got along with.’ So for this idea, it was funny. Steph asked me if I had any ideas for a project. I always thought about going back and documenting a game. Kobe had tried to do a version of this with Spike Lee, ‘Doin’ Work.’ I had heard the allure of that back when it came out in 2009. I remember asking Kobe, ‘What happened?’ I thought it was such a good idea, but it didn’t really work. I think it was Kobe being Kobe. On the day of, he decided he didn’t really feel like doing it. It just didn’t really work. I thought in my mind that it was a cool idea, though.

So I pitched Steph on it. He said, ‘I’ll do that. That sounds like fun. That sounds cool. I trust you.’ The pitch was, “Let’s frame you through the lens of an artist, not an athlete. We’ll capture a single game. And basketball is your canvas.’ He was like, ‘That’s cool. I’ll do that.’ Then we came to these guys [at IMAX]. They said they had wanted to do something. They hadn’t done something basketball-related since ‘Jordan to the Max.’ That was about 25 years ago. Their goal is to reach bigger audiences and kids. There is a theatrical window. Then on ESPN/Disney, it will live on their platform. Then they have a thing that is called an ‘institutional cut.’ You can still occasionally see ‘Jordan to the Max’ in planetariums and science centers. But you need an athlete that transcends the game and that’s kid friendly. That’s Steph. So I came here. They said, ‘If Steph is willing to do it, we’re willing to do it.’ So away we went.”

Before the screening, you mentioned it was surprisingly fitting to capture Steph in a game that he was struggling. At first, it seemed like the perfect time to capture Steph’s game against the Kings because he’s about to hit 4,000 career 3s. But then he’s not hitting shots. How did you wrestle with your emotions in real time?

Chopra: ‘You have Steph. IMAX is on board. You now deal with the Warriors and the NBA to get them to agree. So that takes a while. The league initially said we could do this if the Warriors support it and Steph wants to do it. Also, Steve Kerr is so cool and understood the big idea. We identified to do something after the All-Star game, but not too close to the playoffs because the playoff stakes are higher. So we identified a Saturday game against the Knicks two seasons ago. But then ESPN flexed that game and decided to make it a national broadcast. So the league called and told us there would be too many cameras. So they asked if we could move it up from a Saturday to Thursday night. It was a TNT game, but there are fewer cameras. So we said, ‘Sure’ and we didn’t have much choice.

I convinced myself it was okay. Obviously, showing the Knicks game would’ve been nice. But the idea of just another game against the Kings that’s not a glamour team, but for Steph, every game matters and he’ll prep the same way. So it was good to bring that psychology. Steph reaching 4,000 career 3s was not a thought. You could kind of see it coming, though. On the Tuesday night against Portland, he shot a ton. I thought, ‘Stop shooting, bro!’ But he kept shooting. Fortunately, he did not get the record that night. He landed at 3,998. So we were like, ‘Of course, this is Steph. He will hit two.’ We assumed that. You figured he would at least hit his average. We have 21 cameras. So who knows. Maybe he will have a vintage 40-point performance. But he did walk into the arena and went straight to the training room. I had a headset and we had him mic’d up. I heard him tell the trainer, ‘Something is up with my back.’ He wasn’t going to sit out or anything. But there was definitely a concern that something was up with his back.

So we knew something is off. He has a pretty consistent pre-game routine. But he was getting a lot of work on his back with heating pads and massages. I didn’t talk to him a single time at the game because we wanted to document his process. There was a little bit of panic in the video village with the 21 screens when he’s struggling. I could also hear Coach Kerr because he was wearing a mic. They were talking about his back and restricting his minutes. I wrote out a little pitch to Steph after the game to reorient what we’re going to do: ‘You didn’t have a great game. But there is something in this that even the greatest shooter in the history of the game struggles.’ Even the shot that he had broke the record on was a broken play off a loose ball. There is something about the messiness of that. I told Steph, ‘That seems representative of your process.’ He wrote back that night, ‘The way you articulated this eight-second broken play captures my story.’ He really leaned into it. There weren’t any options. It’s not like we could just shoot another game. It’s a big production. But Steph said, ‘You know my story. Everybody sees and celebrates. But it’s messy. It’s hard. It’s painful.’ That’s something that was pretty cool about it.

The game itself was a conflict. It definitely had that struggle and intention. You also get older. Even then, Steph was already cemented in his status. He’s had more kids. He’s closer to the end than the beginning. The injuries pile up. The last few years, the team has struggled. He definitely has contemplated how much longer does he have. I know he just signed the extension. There is fame, success and money. But that brings its own scrutiny and pressure. He was already a big star in 2018. But since then, you thought about how much he grew.”

Looking at them through that artist lens, how do you compare Steph, Kobe and Brady?

Chopra: “Kobe and Brady are a lot alike. Kobe was definitely about ‘The Black Mamba’ and darkness. He channeled all of that rage. Tom toggles back and forth. There were times he played like he was the 199th pick and everybody discounted him and he was the underdog. But there are times later in his career that he played with joy. Or that he operated in a ‘flow state’ and was more Zen. I think in that respect, Steph relates. There isn’t any darkness. There is grind and the messiness of it. But Steph is also the ‘plays with joy’ guy. He’s a kid. Before the game, he’s taking half-court shots.

Kobe and Steph are very different. They both have the obsession to process, routine, hard work, staying up and staying late. That’s definitely consistent. But the emotion is completely different. Kobe was always intense. We used to joke together, ‘It was the best of times. It was the worst of times’ (laughs). This guy was torture with being around him. It was amazing, especially since I was way younger. It was a challenge in many ways. But Steph is easy to be around, joyful and collaborative and responsive. With Kobe, you never knew day-to-day what was going to happen.”

The other common thread with Kobe, Tom and Steph is their longevity. What window did you have on how all of those three managed that?

Chopra: “They have that relentlessness and will. My observation that, at this level in the NBA and NFL, everybody are all talented. You don’t get to that level unless you’re the best of the best. What separates the Kobe’s, the Tom’s, the Serena Williams,’ the Steph’s is that will. They get knocked down and they get back up. They have that self-talk. They keep motivating themselves to keep on doing it again. I asked Serena one time, ‘What is the secret?’ She said, ‘Everybody asked that. I showed up and did the work. It’s not some magic formula or that I was blessed. I can’t tell you how many times that I woke up in the morning and I didn’t feel like going to practice. But I can’t tell you how many times I didn’t go.’ That’s also Steph. There are not any days off. The workouts are intense. He just wills himself in a way that other athletes don’t. After the game, he showed up in the locker room and other guys were doing their post-game workouts. Then one guy leaves after 15 minutes or 20 minutes. We were there for like an hour-and-a-half with Steph. He just kept on going. That wasn’t performative. That’s what he does. By the end, it’s just us and him. It’s like midnight, and he keeps on going.”

Of all the things shown in the documentary, what’s your favorite moment that you captured?

Chopra: “Ironically, it’s the non-game action. There is a shot where he’s on the bench and has his eyes closed and he’s regulating his breathing. He’s become so aware of his body and his mind. During his pre-game rituals, of course there is the shooting. But he’s also working on his breathing and getting his mind right. Then there is a shot before the game where we had a low-angle shot and you could see the arena. Those are the nerdy film shots that we thought, ‘More of that.’ Half the shooters were from the NBA. Andy Thompson was part of it. I also had a great cinematographer on my team. I told them, ‘All the stuff that you never get to do in broadcast, feel free to do it.’ There is a shot at the top of the arena and there is some obstruction and reflection. You could never do that on a broadcast. It was fun to nerd out on that stuff.”

Steph has made so many 3s, obviously. But it was cool how you were able to edit so many of them into a continuous sequence and a narrative. What went into pulling that off?

Chopra: “Our lead editor is so awesome. The great luxury of the NBA is being able to work with the NBA. So we have access to archives and all of his great highlights. It was nerding out on all of that stuff. I’m curious how this will play out. No one usually gets to do this with creating a documentary and putting it into theatres. Who knows how it’s going to do. But we did a screening a couple of weeks ago in New York in front of a bunch of students and high school basketball players. It was cool. You could tell it resonated with that audience.”

Mark Medina is an NBA contributor to Fadeaway World. Follow him on X, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook and Threads.

This article first appeared on Fadeaway World and was syndicated with permission.