“The Last Dance” has been a rousing success, with many fans tuning into the popular 10-part ESPN docuseries detailing the story about Michael Jordan and the 1997-98 Chicago Bulls on their quest for a second three-peat. Kobe Bryant, who was included in the introduction of Episode 5, had actually caught wind of the extensive footage collected and was hoping to produce the film himself.

According to ESPN's Ramona Shelburne, Bryant met with Jordan's parents to ask for their approval.

Via The Full 48 podcast:

“I actually found out reporting this story that I published today. Kobe actually met with Michael Jordan's folks to see if he could produce ‘The Last Dance' at one point,” said Shelburne. “He was so into this. He was hyped on going up there and he pitched himself to Mike Tollin as an executive producer of this.”

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Bryant didn't stop working after wrapping up his 20 years in the league, quickly going from “Muse,” a 2018 Showtime series detailing his basketball career, to working on “Dear Basketball,” a short animated film based on a letter he wrote to The Players' Tribune in Dec. 2015 announcing his retirement.

Kobe then put his off-the-court talents to work on “The Wizenard Series,” a collection of children's books.

Bryant's mind did not stop working after an illustrious NBA career, and it was only natural that he'd want to be the one producing “The Last Dance” given the now-known close-knit relationship with Jordan,

Shelburne also mentioned that Kobe's awareness of “The Last Dance” footage played a large part in wanting to be followed by a camera crew in his last season, knowing a film or a project series could be made out of it. At this point, it's safe to assume there will be some kind of full-fledged Kobe documentary made in the future.