Coco Gauff Echoes Serena Williams’ Difficult Thoughts While Watching Zendaya’s Bold Portrayal of Tashi Duncan

Zendaya’s brilliant portrayal of Tashi Duncan’s character in her latest movie, Challengers has snatched the limelight lately. Despite not being a tennis player, the American actress enacted Duncan’s character in a way that moved Olympic gold-medalist WTA star Serena Williams. After mentoring this Emmy-winning actress for a Challengers-related project, Williams revealed how Tashi Duncan “gets under your skin like that.”

While Serena Williams’s off-bit review of Tashi Duncan surprised the fraternity, Coco Gauff also joined the bandwagon appreciating Zendaya’s mind-blowing work in the movie. Gauff started an Instagram live right after watching the movie and her fans dropped some of the speech’s excerpts on social media.

Coco Gauff thinks that she could have been “frenemies on tour” with Tashi Duncan

Reigning US Open champion Coco Gauff’s visit to the theatres for Zendaya’s Challengers was an absolute roller coaster ride. A reliable tennis source dropped Gauff’s comments on being friends with Tashi Duncan- “tashi duncan, gurl, we woulda been beefin’ in juniors.“ According to this source, Gauiff also mentioned- “i think in a weird sense, we would have been frenemies on tour. we would have respected each other. she has that dog mentality, which is what i’d respect.”

Another reliable tennis source shared an interesting opinion of the former US Open Champion with the fans on X (formerly Twitter)- “Coco declaring that she and Tashi would have been “frenemies” but that she couldn’t have been friends with the boys because they were smoking and drinking as juniors is the Challengers review I still needed.”

Coco Gauff’s amazing observation of Tashi Duncan’s mental turbulence received much applause from her fans. However, Gauff is not the only one to express such complex thoughts about the film’s protagonist. American legendary former tennis player Serena Williams also shared a similar take.

Serena Williams felt that Zendaya was great in capturing “her character’s tensions”

Not just Coco Gauff, Serena Williams’s recent interview with Vogue about Challengers would offer a similar review of Zendaya’s character Tashi Duncan. Instead of simply praising the film, this former WTA legend chose to reflect on Tashi Duncn’s difficult journey in life. Williams said– “I’ll admit that I found Zendaya’s character, Tashi—who plays in the juniors before going to Stanford, getting injured, and finally coaching Art (Faist), her husband—pretty tough to take. Tashi was just mean, for lack of a better word. But it’s true that when you’re really competitive, you have to make tough decisions, including in your dating life.”

This Olympic gold-medalist tennis player narrated her struggles as she analyzed Tashi Duncan. She expressed how she “was definitely tough at that stage” in her life but she “wasn’t like Tashi“. Williams finally admitted Zendaya’s brilliance- “Her love triangle with them was messy, but that was in service to the story, and I think Zendaya captured her character’s tensions really well. I also think it’s kind of a great sign when a performance gets under your skin like that.”

Coco Gauff’s comments after watching Challengers express a similar point of view with Serena Williams. Both brilliant tennis players admired Zendaya’s intense hard work in portraying a complicated character like Tashi Duncan. Sharing what they loved or disliked about the character, Gauff and Williams impress fans with their unique observation about the movie.