Hudson Williams, the 24-year-old star of HBO Max’s breakout hit Heated Rivalry, is adjusting to a new reality. Just weeks ago, he was serving pasta at a family restaurant in British Columbia. Today, his face is all over the internet as fans worldwide fall for the show’s mix of high-stakes hockey and secret romance. In a series of new interviews, Williams opens up about the whirlwind of sudden fame, his deep connection to his character, and why the success of this “gay hockey show” has taken him completely by surprise.
The series, which premiered on November 28, 2025, on Crave in Canada and HBO Max in the U.S., quickly became a viral sensation. It follows the clandestine, years-long relationship between two rival professional hockey players: Williams’s character, the anxious Canadian prodigy Shane Hollander, and his Russian counterpart, Ilya Rozanov, played by Connor Storrie. Based on the popular novels by Rachel Reid and adapted by Jacob Tierney, the show blends intense sports drama with explicit queer romance, creating a phenomenon that has catapulted its young leads into the spotlight.
The Sudden Shift: From Paycheck to Paycheck to Overnight Fame
For Williams, the speed of this change is the hardest part to process. Before landing the role, he was working as a waiter at The Old Spaghetti Factory in New Westminster, living paycheck to paycheck in an expensive city.
“I was serving at The Old Spaghetti Factory… I would argue less swanky, but I loved it there,” Williams said. “I had a great outlook. In a lot of ways, it was a lot easier than what it’s like now.”
When he first signed on for Heated Rivalry, Williams expected a more niche success. He looked to showrunner Jacob Tierney’s previous hockey-themed hits like Letterkenny and Shoresy as a metric, but thought the show’s specific focus would limit its audience. The explosive reaction proved him wrong.
“I didn’t think it would blow up to this. I thought it’d be more of a niche fan base… I thought I’d maybe get 100,000 [Instagram followers] by episode six release… so this already is like, oh, f***, did not expect this,” he admitted with a laugh.
Building a “Nightmare for HR” Chemistry With Co-Star Connor Storrie
A major driver of the show’s success is the palpable chemistry between Williams and his co-star, Connor Storrie. Both actors credit an instant, deep trust that made their challenging intimate scenes possible.
“Me and Hudson had the chemistry down before we even started acting,” Storrie told Vanity Fair. Williams joked about their close bond, adding, “We got comfortable just being inches from each other’s face and invading each other’s personal space. A nightmare for HR.”
This comfort was essential. The show features numerous explicit sex scenes, which the actors approached with technical help from an intimacy coordinator and a shared professional mindset. However, Williams notes that the emotional scenes between the characters were often more meaningful and easier to perform than the physical ones.
“So much of their story is them not being 100% authentic with one another,” Williams explained. “So when we actually had scenes that we got to sit down and genuinely act… it was fun and so easy. When we had scenes that had to be emotional like that, I don’t know if it’s ever been easier in my life to feed into it.”
Why Shane Hollander Is a Deeply Personal Role
For Williams, playing Shane Hollander is more than just a job. The character is written as autistic, a trait Williams connected to through his personal life. He drew inspiration from his father, who is on the spectrum and has a “hyper-cerebral” way of navigating the world.
This personal connection fueled Williams’s performance and his hopes for the character’s impact. He has been moved by fans who see themselves in Shane, and he is also proud to represent his own heritage on screen.
“I didn’t really get to see many people like me growing up on the screen,” said Williams, whose mother is Korean. “So, me and my mom both have like sort of a tense emotion of just—I get to be hopefully an Asian actor that kids get to see on their screen and that kind of gets to be normalized and celebrated, hopefully.”
If he could give his character one piece of advice, it would be to let go of unrealistic pressures. “I would tell Shane that his ideas of perfection and masculinity are wrong. They’re immature, they’re juvenile—and that’s not his fault, but he’s going to feel a lot less pressure and a lot less discomfort in himself if he changes those,” Williams said.
Navigating New Fame and Online Noise
With fame comes a level of public scrutiny neither actor was prepared for. Williams describes the current moment as overwhelming, feeling like “a compass on a magnetic field” pointing in every direction. To cope, he and Storrie have developed a habit of periodically deleting their social media apps to avoid the noise.
While Williams admits he does care about audience reception and sometimes “dips in and out” of online discussions, he tries to maintain perspective. He finds that for every negative comment, there are hundreds of positive ones, and some of the overtly mean remarks are so ridiculous they just make him laugh.
The actors recently experienced their first true taste of fan mania during a surprise appearance at Hi Tops, a gay sports bar in West Hollywood. Williams, channeling his “Canadian” sensibility, was nervous about taking up space, while Storrie felt the dynamic had shifted from fans loving the story to loving them. Their fear that the crowd might not recognize them was unfounded—the audience knew exactly who they were.
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The Road Ahead: Season 2 and Lasting Impact
The whirlwind is set to continue. In mid-December 2025, it was officially announced that Heated Rivalry has been renewed for a second season. The show has also expanded its global reach, with distribution added in New Zealand and Spain.
As for what comes next personally, Williams is keeping his expectations in check but his hopes high. He joked about the range of possibilities, from a poorly written YA show offer to a call from acclaimed director Luca Guadagnino. For now, he’s focused on the present and the unique story he gets to tell.
He believes the show’s success lies in its boldness and quality. “I think the writing is brilliant,” Williams stated, calling the scripts “Emmy’s quality.” He also sees the show filling a gap, offering a raw and committed look at queer romance in sports. As he put it, “If ‘Challengers’ was the cocktease of it all, then our show just leans in and gets in there.”
The series continues to release new episodes. Heated Rivalry streams new episodes on Fridays on HBO Max in the U.S., Crave in Canada, and on various platforms in Australia, New Zealand, and Spain.
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