SPOILER ALERT: This article contains spoilers for Episode 5 of “Heated Rivalry,” now streaming on HBO Max.
If Season 2 of “Heated Rivalry” stays true to Rachel Reid’s “Game Changers” novel series, Stanley Cup winner Scott Hunter will buy the gay bar Kingfisher Tavern.
François Arnaud, who plays Scott, already knows who he’d like to guest star as a patron of the watering hole.
“If I’m the bartender, I want Jennifer Coolidge as a barfly,” Arnaud says. “I want her there at all times.”
Based on Reid’s queer romances, “Heated Rivalry” was adapted and directed by Jacob Tierney. HBO Max acquired the show from Canadian streamer Crave and premiered the first two of its six episodes over Thanksgiving weekend.
In Episode 3, Scott has a hot and heavy romance with smoothie shop barista Kip (Robbie G.K.), but they call it quits when Scott, who is deeply closeted, refuses to celebrate Kip’s birthday at the Kingfisher. But in Episode 5, Kip is in the stands watching Scott and his team win the Stanley Cup. In an eye-dropping twist, Scott not only motions for Kip to join him on the ice at the end of the game, but he comes out of the closet by kissing him.
“He can’t believe it himself, and yet he falls into it,” Arnaud says of Scott. “There are so many things happening at once. There’s a giddiness and excitement and some fear, for sure, but also he’s pushing through that fear. I think it plays really well.”
François Arnaud as Scott Hunter and Robbie G.K. as Kip Grady
Courtesy of HBO Max
Arnaud says he cried when he watched the final cut of the scene for the first time. “Seeing it afterwards with all the people added with CGI, I felt like I was watching this at a real hockey game,” he says. “It was like, ‘Fuck, this is epic.’”
After the kiss, Ilya Rosanov (Connor Storrie) is seen calling Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams). Ilya tells Shane that, despite some earlier trepidations, he will take him up on his offer to spend some of the summer together at his vacation cottage, uttering the now viral line, “I’m coming to the cottage.”
“I think they’re kind of living vicariously through Scott,” Arnaud says. “They see the possibilities for themselves. It becomes this reassuring aspect. That’s why Scott and Kip’s book in the original books is called ‘Game Changer.’ That’s really what he does for them. He changes the game.”
Arnaud becomes emotional, even tearing up while talking more about the scene. “I have so much tenderness for Scott. It just feels like he deserves it. It’s so earned,” he says. “And then seeing [Shane and Ilya] watching from home and the song [Wolf Parade’s “I’ll Believe in Anything”] that was used in angst at the top of Episode 3 and then used again for this liberating moment, I heard the lyrics for that song for the first time, singing about sunshine, which he deserves.”
Arnaud teases the Season 1 finale next week as having another “big moment” for Scott: “Jacob texted me and said he just rewatched the top of Episode 6. He said, ‘Oh, God, you made me cry again.’”
“Heated Rivalry” Episode 6 premieres on HBO Max on Dec. 26.
