Zendaya wanted to be on “Challengers” because it scared her

“You don’t know what tennis is – it’s a relationship.” This is one of the first lines of Tashi Duncan (Zendaya) in Challengers, the tennis prodigy “who will make her whole family millionaires” as mentioned early in the film. He tells her to Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor) and Art Donaldson (Mike Faist), two boys who by the time he meets them have already been dubbed “Fire & Ice”, as a dynamic tennis duo that swept the field. The young men don’t know it yet, but noticing it will define not only their careers, but their lives as well.

This is a big movie, especially for Zendaya. His former star Disney Channel quickly gained worldwide attention thanks to her complex and compelling performance as Rue in HBO’s Euphoria. Now he faces beasts in the sci-fi universe of Dune and clings to webs in the new Marvel Spider-Man movies. Her stamp in front of and behind the camera for his new film Luca Guadagnino scripted by Justin Kuritzkes, it will be decisive for one that, as in the overall work of the creator, is full of underlying tension.

After all, who can forget the infamous scene with the peach in the Call Me By Your Name, or his most recent cannibalistic love story, Bones And All. But in Challengers, Guadagnino brings power to the fore and asks: What does it look like to want to win at all costs?

“We asked Justin to produce and we had quite a bit of competition,” the film’s co-producer, Amy Pascal, shares with us in a Zoom press conference. “But I think what really locked it down — and I don’t think Zendaya knows this but I’m going to say it now — is that we promised to get her to do it. I told him, “I know there are a lot of other producers, but I know Zendaya personally and I’m going to get her to do this movie.” [γέλια]. And that’s why Justin chose us, I’m sure.”

Having previously won two Emmy Awards, one Golden Globe and having been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2022 at just 25 years old, it was already clear that Zendaya is more than a force to be reckoned with in Hollywood. Now she’s learned that while she remains grateful for the wave of adulation and love that got her this far, she has the right to decline a fan photo if she’s on her day off or doesn’t feel like performing for the world. This new perspective, however, did not stop her from dating her co-stars during the filming of the film. He was afraid that the attention he would attract would spoil their evening.

In the Challengers proves why she’s establishing herself as one of the strongest voices in the industry right now, but also, most importantly, why she doesn’t need to be pigeonholed into one type of role.

Her Tashi is brutal, calculating and merciless. She uses her looks to make men puppets and communicates only the information she deems necessary. It may seem like a difficult feat for Zendaya considering she’s one of the most lovable celebrities in the world right now, but it was that rawness that drew her to the role.

“Tashi was a character that I feel like I’ve never read before and never seen before,” she describes to us via Zoom. “It freaked me out. So I thought, “maybe I should do it”. To be involved in a creative sense, to be of service to the characters and our incredible team here, and to help in any way I can to help make the film a reality. When I heard that Luca had read the script and was interested in doing it, it was like a dream. I’ve been a fan of his work for so long.”

Guadagnino joined the project at the same time as Zendaya. Since then he maintains that the actress could become an “amazing director” because according to him, she feels nowhere more free, safer, more focused than on set. When she’s not shooting a scene herself, she wanders around with her handheld camera and observes scenes she’s not in, paying attention to how storyboards are made, how notes are delivered, how directors rehearse and work with their workshop. She also has a good eye for casting, as Faist and O’Connor, both with terrible displacement in Challengers, were her suggestions. Combined with her strict discipline and the scientific interest she has in the technique, the creator believes that her path is paved.

“We had met once at a Fenty dinner and he was so kind and sweet to me,” Zendaya recalled. “She helped me find vegetarian options because I didn’t know Italian [γέλια]. I loved him. I was hoping to work with him in some capacity. We spoke on Zoom and I could tell he understood the kind of film we wanted to make. He understood the characters deeply. Until we joked about what kind of lotion Tashi would use before going to bed at night. These are small details that told me, “my God, he knows this woman, you understand her, he sees her”.

She herself came into contact with the script during the filming of Euphoria.

“Everybody knows that when I’m working it’s really hard to get me to do anything other than focus on what I’m going to do the next day on set,” he laughs. “So we did a reading at my agent’s house and I just fell in love with the script. It was wonderful. It also made me anxious because of how complex these characters are. And I couldn’t determine what kind of movie it was. It was so funny, but I wouldn’t say it was a comedy. There was drama, but I wouldn’t say it was only drama. And it had tennis, but it wasn’t the classic sports movie. It all came together in a beautiful way that was scary, but exciting all the same.”

Despite her Amazonian figure, Zendaya is no athlete. She never liked sports as a child, and now insists she only works out when she has to. She knew nothing about tennis, “only Venus and Serena”. With the input of Brad Gilbert, Coco Gauff’s coach, Zendaya, Faist and O’Connor trained together for several months, on three parallel courts in the mornings, and then they had time at the gym, lunch and rehearsals.

“It was one of those things that made it scary as a challenge because my character is supposed to be great tennis player. I was never anything like that. I was incredibly anxious if she showed up. I was going crazy trying to be a tennis player. I was trying to learn the basics. I remember when I started hitting the ball, it was going into the trees. He was never even close to the field. Tennis is not a game you can just learn. If you haven’t been playing since the age of four the word says, it won’t happen in your lifetime [γέλια]. You go to practice, you feel like something clicked, and then you go the next day and you can’t do anything. You can’t recreate it. Back to zero. At one point I said to them, “I want to try and see what it’s like to return a serve”, so they hit me with a real one. He flew past me so fast! And then I still wore glasses. Now I’ve had LASIK, but then I couldn’t even see it. So at some point I realized that my approach had to be different, because as soon as the ball was coming my way, my fundamentals and my form suddenly disappeared.”

The solution was found in another of its properties. That of the trained dancer.

“Luca had then started building the tennis scenes and choreographing them. Their every shot was storyboarded, so thought out and so meticulous. So I said, “ok, maybe that’s how I should approach it.” Like choreography. I’m a dancer I thought, so let’s dance it. We had amazing tennis doubles and I wanted to sync up with mine. I wanted to understand her steps, her patterns, her movements, and try to make them as flawless as possible. I wanted to look like her mirror. Then I would videotape myself next to her and watch the footage. This was my introduction to looking like a tennis player. Because at some point I realized I wasn’t going to be a tennis player, but I could pretend! [γέλια]».

Like every Guadagnino film, Challengers pulses with sexual desire.

When the Challengers trailer was first released, the social media frenzy was immediate, quickly dubbed by many as “the movie with the trio”. Like every Guadagnino film, Challengers pulses with sexual desire, but not necessarily in the ways one might think. It features two men sharing a sauna as their bodies drip with sweat, knowing that the only thing protecting them from complete nudity is a white towel. It unfolds with Patrick and Art sharing a phallic-looking churro, aggressively biting into it as they gaze deeply into each other’s eyes. It is the prolonged eye contact of every character combination in the film.

“We keep saying that tennis is the sex in the movie,” Zendaya points out. “Tennis, I think, is a metaphor for many things – for desire, passion, pain, anger, frustration. I think they all use tennis as a way to communicate with each other when they can’t find the words.”

“It’s refreshing that this is a female character who doesn’t have to be likable, who doesn’t care if you like her, who doesn’t ask for forgiveness.”

But if she feels so confident about Tashi’s character, why did she ask the audience before the screening of the film not to judge her too harshly?

“It’s refreshing that this is a female character who doesn’t have to be likable, who doesn’t care if you like her, who doesn’t ask for forgiveness,” she explains. “I think that’s maybe refreshing for some people, and I understand because it was refreshing for me when I read it. That’s why I wanted to play it anyway! But I feel like it’s our natural instinct to judge people. We all do it. But I think the beauty of this movie is how your mind will be changed. I know mine changes every time I see it or every time I read it. It changes my perception every time I see it – and I made it! – because I’m still surprised. So I say before the screenings that people don’t be too critical of Tashi just because I know they will be wrong. They will have an initial reaction and then go back and change it. That’s the beauty here, just empathizing with the characters.”

So it was worth it to embody someone who scares her.

“Oh yes. For sure”.