You’re right. Prior to this project coming together, I met with Justin Kuritzkes, the writer. I’d just moved to New York and it was just a coffee meeting, just to chat and be introduced. This is Justin’s first feature film, so I was sent the script of Challengers two years before and we met. I was like, “This film is amazing. It’s so beautifully written.” And he said, “Which character do you see yourself playing?” I was like, “Obviously Art. Obviously.” So I was exactly the same as you. But that’s the dream. You always want to play stuff that feels further from you. It’s the bigger challenge.
How did it feel watching yourself in that mode?
Nice, I think? I don’t know. [ Laughs] Well, first of all, when I first saw it, I was like, “What happened? Where’s it all gone?” I’ve now learned that you can’t just go to the gym for three months and then stop and it’ll be there forever. So that was a good, late lesson for me to learn.
Talk about the choreography of the intimate scene with you, Mike, and Zendaya. Patrick and Art are seducing Zendaya’s Tashi before things get a bit messier between the three. What was filming that like?
Luca had a very clear idea of what happens on the bed. The idea of me and Mike, with Zendaya in the middle—this idea that it’s Kissing, Kissing, and then it turns into this three-way kiss—and then suddenly Mike and I are kissing. That was very clear. We all kind of figured out, how are we going to do this? How does this work?
There is an element of improvisation with it. It was fairly organic. We did little things, like, when they’re sitting on the floor and she goes onto the bed, I was up in a flash and not holding back. That came from us knowing our characters well, and knowing the dynamics between the three of us.
You also seem to know your La Chimera character very well. I know you actually sent Alice a fan letter before you were cast. What’s your origin story with her work and how that led here?
It’s a good one. My younger brother is an academic. He teaches in Edinburgh, Scotland, and he’s one of the best people I know in my life. He’s my best friend. He used to go to the cinema and call me, like he was bridging a gap and being like, “I’m interested in what you do,” which he never needs to do, because I do very little to throw myself into what he does. I’d be like, “Cool, what’d you see?” And he’d be like, “This film, Spider-Man. It’s amazing. Really interesting. Guy gets infected by this spider.” [Laughs]
So he’d go to the mainstream films. But then one day he called me and he was like, “I’ve just seen this Italian movie called Happy as Lazzaro, and I think it’s the best film I’ve ever seen.” I went and watched it that night, and I came out and I felt like I found a filmmaker that was making films for just me. So I wrote this letter, saying, “Dear Alice, I love your work. Please can we hang out?” But I had no address. She lives very remote in Italy, in this small community. No one knows where she lives. I’d write letters with a little side note on the envelope, saying, “If anyone knows where she lives, can you just get it to her?”