The world at large is definitely interested in who Zendaya is kissing offscreen—hello Tom Holland!—but is also interested in who she is kissing onscreen, and the superstar finds it all “very odd,” according to Us Weekly.
As her latest film, Challengers, prepares to hit theaters on Friday, Zendaya admitted she doesn’t fully understand why people care about her kissing scenes (and beyond). While being interviewed on Jake’s Takes on Sunday, she was asked by host Jake Hamilton about the “abnormal amount of attention paid” to these types of scenes by the media.
“I have no idea [why],” she said. “I don’t know if it’s because they want it to be a viral thing, but I have noticed that—with me, specifically. I feel like others actors don’t—if there was somebody else here, you probably wouldn’t ask that question. But yeah, it is a part of my job and it’s a completely normal part of the job, despite maybe other people’s perception of our job. But yeah, it is odd.” She added “Thank you for bringing that up, because I was thinking the same thing. This is weird.”
The Challengers trailer features what appears to be the leadup to a steamy threesome—but Zendaya clarified that the scenes in the film don’t actually show much. “What’s really special about this movie is that it is incredibly sexy, but there surprisingly [are] no sex scenes,” she told IndieWire. “I’ve been asked a lot about sex scenes from people who have seen the movie, and I’m like, ‘What sex scenes?’”
The film shows Zendaya as Tashi, a tennis star-turned-coach embroiled in a love triangle with two other athletes—her husband, Art (played by Mike Faist), and her ex Patrick (played by Josh O’Connor). Challengers sees Zendaya step into the leading lady role as a grown woman (in the film, Tashi is 30) rather than playing a teenager, a la, say, Euphoria. She told Vogue that she found the role “so refreshing,” adding “It was also kind of scary, because I was like, I hope people buy me as my own age, or maybe a little bit older, because I have friends that have kids, or are having kids.” (For the record, she’s 27 years old and will turn 28 in September.)
Zendaya told Elle last August, speaking specifically about her role in Challengers, “From a character perspective, I want to find things that will push me,” she said. “As I get older, you know, I can’t play a teenager for the rest of my life.”
