‘challengers’ director luca guadagnino on creating a tennis film built around desire: “i know next to nothing about tennis, but i know a great deal about desire” — contenders los angeles

“I’ll tell you the moment I knew that Luca [Guadagnino] was the perfect director for this,” _Challengers_ writer Justin Kuritzkes said. “He had just read the script and we were talking on

the phone and Luca said, ‘I know next to nothing about tennis but I know a great deal about desire.’” At a panel for _Challengers_ at Deadline’s Contenders Film: Los Angeles, Kuritzkes was

joined by director Luca Gudagnino, producer Amy Pascal and actor Josh O’Connor. RELATED: 2024-25 AWARDS SEASON CALENDAR: DATES FOR OSCARS, GRAMMYS, TONYS, GUILDS & MORE “What I loved

about the script so much, is that it’s about three people who desperately don’t want something to happen. And they spend three years fearing that this will happen, and then it does… and

they’re okay,” says Pascal. “And I think that’s really wonderful, unusual thing to make a movie about, because it’s such a human experience that we spend our whole lives being scared of

something and then the actual event comes about and you learn you can survive it.” In terms of previous experience with tennis, it turns out the person with the most experience on stage was

not a panelist, but actually Deadline’s moderator Pete Hammond. “I didn’t know anything about it, and I know nothing about it now,” joked Guadagnino. RELATED: THE 2025 OSCARS: EVERYTHING WE

KNOW SO FAR ABOUT THE NOMINATIONS, CEREMONY, DATE & HOST A boot camp was set up for the actors with tennis coach Brad Gilbert, though O’Connor says it taught him more than just the

sport. “I’ve never worked out to that extent in all my life, and all of the confidence that brought,” he says, “for me, it felt like Luca leading me to this place of Patrick Zweig full of

confidence and forthright. They were the more important aspects of that.” Check out the panel video above. RELATED: DEADLINE LAUNCHES NEW AWARDS HUB – READ THE ‘GLADIATOR II’ COVER STORY,

AWARDS NEWS, FEATURES, INTERVIEWS & MORE _The presenting sponsor for this year’s Contenders Film: Los Angeles is __United for Business. Sponsors are Eyeptizer Eyewear, Final Draft +

ScreenCraft, and partners are Four Seasons Maui, 11 Ravens and Robina Benson Design House._ RELATED: CONTENDERS FILM: LOS ANGELES — DEADLINE’S COMPLETE COVERAGE