The movie “Challengers” came out on April 22 starting at number one box office and created a stir throughout the country. After seeing the trailer for the movie, most may think it is a film solely about sex, but in reality it is a movie revolving around the crazy world of tennis and athletics.
A film made out of love for the athletic world, the starring actors of the movie Zendaya, Mike Faist, and Josh O’Connor trained tirelessly in the sport. Even though they trained together for the competition scenes in the movie, when they began practicing the scenes Zendaya realized she couldn’t act to her best with a ball moving eighty miles an hour towards her. The production decided that the best plan would be to have tennis doubles come in and have the actors run through the motions of playing tennis without the ball.
This change made the tennis competitions feel more like scenes of choreography than anything stressful, making it easier for Zendaya to act to the best of her ability. This act of making the tennis choreography didn’t mean that the actors worked any less. They continued to do the training, making sure they understood how hard their characters worked in this sport. The dedication of athletes was a forefront of this movie, which the actors took to heart using their time training together to grow closer to each other and their characters.
