Zendaya’s ‘Challengers’ Press Tour Style: Game On
Making a case for the obvious.
Hello! I am back in your inboxes with a much-requested newsletter: So (very) many thoughts on Zendaya and her style tour de force to promote Challengers. The award-winning actress has served up an array of conversation-starting looks, hyping the new movie that just hit theaters.
Challengers tells the fictional story of a tennis prodigy turned coach named Tashi Duncan who is determined to help her all-star husband out of a losing streak. Along the way, they both must face the past they shared with a now washed-up tennis player. Filmmaker Luca Guadagnino “puts an art-house topspin on the sports movie, with fierce competition, even fiercer personalities and athletic chutzpah,” wrote Brian Truitt in his review for USA Today. Manohla Dargis, writing in the New York Times, described Challengers as a “continually changing love triangle involving two besotted men and a sharp, beautiful woman with killer instincts and personal style.”
The commitment to fashion while telling a sports story is not lost on me. “Tashi goes from being this kind of suburban girl,” Guadagnino told W magazine, “to a powerhouse...And power means how you control your life, how you control other people’s lives, how you control your look, and how you make your look be the definitive answer to the world.” To that end, Guadagnino tapped Jonathan Anderson, creative director of Loewe, to be the movie’s costume designer. “The great thing was we had Zendaya, who understands fashion inside out,” Anderson told the magazine. “She becomes part of something larger — it’s not just fashion, it’s popular culture. She uses clothing as a kind of instrument.”
We saw that throughout the packed press tour, a parade of more than two dozen looks. The fashion was put together by Law Roach, Zendaya’s long-time stylist who describes himself as an “image architect.”
Below, a look at the pair’s creative partnership as well as the fashion world’s divided reaction to some of the styles. Keep scrolling for why I believe in “obvious” fashion and my top 10 looks from the press tour.
Do you have a favorite Zendaya-Challengers moment? Let me know in the comments.
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💖 ICYMI: My Barbie press tour fashion coverage, including the origins of the doll’s style, why pink is such a divisive color and my Barbie press tour fashion analysis.
So Many Thoughts on Zendaya’s ‘Challengers’ Press Tour Style
All-Star Creative Collab
While I was collaging Zendaya’s Challengers fashion, two words came to mind: GAME ON. Because that’s what marketing a movie is all about, after all. It’s a push to get people to the theaters. And nobody plays that game quite as well as Zendaya and Law Roach.