Guadagnino, Zendaya, O’Connor & Faist - "Challengers"

Luca Guadagnino has set himself quite an ensemble for his next film as Zendaya, Josh O’Connor and Mike Faist tapped to star in Challengers (O’Connor and Faist are still in final negotiations, Zendaya is set). MGM recently acquired rights to the package with Amy Pascal, Guadagnino, Zendaya, and Rachel O’Connor of Pascal Pictures producing. Justin Kuritzkes penned the script.

The story follows Tashi, a tennis player turned coach, has taken her husband, Art, and transformed him from a mediocre player into a world-famous grand slam champion. To jolt him out of his recent losing streak, she makes him play a “Challenger” event — close to the lowest level of tournament on the pro tour — where he finds himself standing across the net from the once-promising, now burnt-out Patrick: his former best friend and Tashi’s former boyfriend.

While the project is now eyeing a March start, the package has been coming together since late last year with the ever busy Guadagnino zeroing in on it as his next film after reading the recent draft. The package began to heat up when he was able to meet with Zendaya for the Tashi role, and she was instantly intrigued and soon attached herself to the package that began making the rounds to various studios who loved the combo of the two. MGM was the front-runner to land it at the top of the year and while deal points were being worked out, O’Connor and Faist, who have become two of the industries fastest rising stars began talks to join Zendaya on the project.