Are ‘Heated Rivalry’ Actors Gay? The creator closes the question

‘Heated Rivalry’ creator Jacob Tierney said during a recent interview with Extra that the real-life sexuality of its stars is irrelevant compared to the “enthusiasm and willingness” they bring to HBO’s new queer sports drama series.

“I don’t think there’s any reason to get into that,” Tierney said when asked if the sexuality of stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie is relevant to the show. “I’ll tell you something about the casting of both roles. You can’t ask questions like that when you’re casting, can you? It’s actually against the law. So you have to gauge someone’s enthusiasm and willingness to do the work.”

He added, “And that’s what’s so impressive about both of these guys, is that they came into this being like, ‘Yes, we’re here to do this, and we’re here to make this story feel authentic and be as real as possible.’ And they knocked it the fuck out of the park.”

In Heated Rivalry, Williams and Storrie play rising hockey pros Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov, respectively. Despite playing for rival teams, the pair develop a romance off the ice.

Williams recently told Out Magazine that his chemistry with Storrie has an intense and unexpected authenticity unmatched by other potential co-stars.

“I read with another possible Ilya, and it was good. But something about Connor,” he said. “There was an inexplicable X-factor that just felt more realistic than I thought it could be. And that was something. I had a quote that I told Jacob at one point about my reading session with Connor in particular.”

In the same interview, Tierney recalled the encounter with Williams afterward: “Hudson told me, ‘The other guy was good, but Connor felt like he was going to pin me down and fuck me,'” later adding, “That’s literally what he said. And I thought, ‘Well, I guess I did this right.'”