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How the Challengers screenwriter crafted one of this year's most delicious love triangles

How the Challengers screenwriter crafted one of this year's most delicious love triangles

How the Challengers screenwriter crafted one of this year's most delicious love triangles
Stewart Cook/Getty Images; Amazon MGM Studios

Out got the chance to speak to writer Justin Kuritzkes on the red carpet at the LA premiere of Challengers.

Churros aren't the only delicious thing being offered up in Challengers!

The new tennis-themed drama film from Call Me by Your Name and Bones and All director Luca Guadagnino and screenwriter Justin Kuritzkes stars Zendaya, Josh O'Connor, and Mike Faist in career-defining roles and features a love triangle dynamic that'll keep audiences on the edge of their seats in eager, "will they, won't they" anticipation.

Challengers follows longtime tennis rivals Art Donaldson (Faist) and Patrick Zweig (Josh O'Connor) as they reconnect with each other during a "challengers" match in New York state. The two have a complex relationship with each other, as they were once roommates and best friends whose lives were thrown into some chaos when Tashi Duncan (Zendaya), a former tennis prodigy who suffered a debilitating knee injury during her college years, comes around. Both Art and Patrick have feelings for Tashi (and maybe each other) that might need to be hashed out on the tennis court, making for one of the year's most delicious, homoerotic, addictive movie experiences!

While covering the red carpet at the Los Angeles premiere of the film, Out got the chance to speak to Kuritzkes, and he opened up about the initial inspiration for the film, working with Guadagnino, and more.

"Luca is one of the best to do it," Kurtizkes told Out when asked about the tension-filled love/hate relationship between Patrick and Art and how he and Guadagnino crafted that.

"I think it was very important to both of us, but Luca had this phrasing that he used, which was, 'In any love triangle, all the corners should touch.'" he said. "That was something that we talked about really early on in the process after he had signed on to direct, and I think that's a really beautiful way to talk about the complexity of a love triangle and the complexity of the emotions and the desires that are flowing within a relationship between three people. So he was really the perfect person to bring that to life."

Watch Out's full interview with Justin Kuritzkes in the video above. Challengers premieres in theaters on April 26.

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Raffy Ermac

Raffy is a Los Angeles-based writer, editor, video creator, critic, and the editor in chief of Out.com.

Raffy is a Los Angeles-based writer, editor, video creator, critic, and the editor in chief of Out.com.