New York Times critic Brooks Atkinson hailed Gossett’s “admirable and winning performance,” saying that it displayed “the whole range of Spencer’s turbulence.”

The production ran from September to November 1953, cutting into the basketball season.

“Very often rehearsals, public appearances and matinees will conflict with practice sessions and games,” the young Gossett told The Brooklyn Eagle at the time. “I have basketball on my mind and will work out and play in as many games as possible.”

He would even bring a basketball backstage at the Lyceum.

After high school, he went on to New York University, where he won a basketball scholarship and studied drama. After college, the Knicks came calling, and he started training with the team.

But Broadway beckoned too.

The revered playwright Lorraine Hansberry called Gossett directly to see if he would perform her gripping family drama “A Raisin in the Sun,” which was produced on Broadway in 1959. The play revolves around housing discrimination on the South Side of Chicago.

If Gossett was caught between two passions, money made his decision easier. And he later said he picked the right path.

“They said the part comes with a $700 per diem, more money than most professional athletes had in the bank at the time,” he told People magazine in an article this year. “I put the basketball down, and the rest is history.”

©2024 New York Daily News. Visit nydailynews.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.