Director Luca Guadagnino's latest tennis thriller, "Challengers," surprisingly draws inspiration from the controversial 2018 US Open final, as revealed by the film's screenwriter.
Crafted by playwright and novelist Justin Kuritzkes, "Challengers" features Zendaya in the role of Tashi, a former professional tennis player turned coach who finds herself entangled in a love triangle between two friends and competitive adversaries, portrayed by Mike Faist and Josh O'Connor.
Kuritzkes disclosed during a recent press briefing that the characters were not modeled after real-life tennis stars. Instead, he divulged that the concept stemmed from his fascination with the tumultuous tennis showdown between Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka at the 2018 US Open.
In that historic match, Osaka, then 20 years old, triumphed over tennis icon Williams in three consecutive sets, clinching her first Grand Slam singles title and becoming the first Japanese player to do so.
However, Osaka's historic victory was overshadowed by Williams' highly publicized outburst, triggered by a series of code violations issued by the umpire for receiving coaching, damaging her racquet in frustration, and engaging in verbal altercation by accusing the umpire of being a "thief" for penalizing her a point.
"Immediately, this struck me as this intensely cinematic situation where you're all alone on your side of the court and there's this one other person in this massive tennis stadium who cares as much about what happens to you as you do, but you can't talk to them," explained Kuritzkes, as reported by Business Insider.
"For whatever reason, it just clicked in my mind," he continued. "Well, what if you really needed to talk about something? And what if it was something beyond tennis? What if it was something that was going on with the two of you? And what if it involved the person on the other side of the net? How would you have that conversation and how could you communicate the tension of that situation using the tools that are specific to film?"
"Challengers" is currently playing in theaters.
Ahead of its release, "Challengers" garnered heaps of praise from critics. According to Clarisse Loughrey, reviewing for The Independent, the Luca Guadagnino-directed film is a five-star triumph and "the most enthralling sports movie in years," with Zendaya's performance standing out as particularly noteworthy.
"Loughrey writes, "Challengers allows every slow-mo shot of Zendaya's bouncing curls and her regal posture to further the argument that she could be the one to reverse the death of the movie star. But she grounds Tashi, too, when that hyper-confidence is allowed to falter for a moment, and something raw and ugly slips by."
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