'Challengers' star Zendaya says players have thanked her for 'making tennis cool'

The pop-culture phenomenon Challengers didn't only impress movie-goers this summer at the box office. It also earned rave reviews from its real-life counterparts on tour, according to the film's A-list star Zendaya.

"I've had a couple tennis players say, 'Thanks for making tennis sexy,' or 'making tennis cool,'" the 28-year-old actress said in a recent interview with *Entertainment Weekly*. "And I was like, I feel like tennis has always been cool and sexy, but I'll take it. A lot of people have tried to get into tennis now, so I think that's fun."

Zendaya, a former prodigy-turned-coach after injury ended her career, and her co-stars Mike Faist, her Grand Slam-winning husband, and Josh O'Connor, her ex-boyfriend whose career never took off to an elite level, play a trio of one-time junior tennis stars who reconnect as adults, with a love triangle developing between them. The film grossed more than $90 million worldwide at the box office, and earned two thumbs up from Serena Williams (though other players weren't as convinced).

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To promote the film, Zendaya and her co-stars appeared at several of the world's biggest tennis tournaments this year, from the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells and the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters to Wimbledon. In addition, the actress was credited with revitalizing "tenniscore" into the fashion mainstream, as she wore several sport-inspired looks on various red carpets on the media tour.

The film notably featured Brad Gilbert as a tennis consultant, and the trio's on-screen chemistry was fostered in part through their tennis training, Zendaya added.

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"I think also during our tennis training, sometimes obviously we are focused, determined, whatever, but we also had times where we were just having a good time," she said. "We treated it almost like P.E. class. Sometimes our physical trainer would have us do warmups before we would do the tennis training. We did games and stuff like that.

"Just having those kind of fun, lighthearted moments to hang out and get to know each other all in a friendship level and then working out ... we had these bonding moments."