Olympics opening ceremony shows 2024 really is the year of the ménage à trois

‘Challengers’ at MY Olympics?

Team Patrick… Team Art… Team USA!!
Credit: NBC / Josh Sawyer (@jesawyer) / NAOMI BAKER / Contributor / AFP via Getty Images

While the 2024 Paris Olympics kicked off with a parade of nations floating down the Seine, a torch bearer doing parkour through the Louvre, and the literal decapitation of Marie Antoinette, the internet was captivated by a much smaller part of the performance.

“Did I just watch the Challengers hotel scene at the Paris Olympics Opening Ceremony,” wrote Twitter user @kasiakovacs, referring to a “steamy” (the words of opening ceremony commentators) scene in which three neon-clad dancers stared longingly at each other and then quickly ran into a private room — getting up to something NSFW, certainly.

The tweet captures what has been months of fervor over director Luca Guadagnino’s tennis threesome blockbuster, starring Zendaya, Josh O’Connor, and Mike Faist as star-crossed paramours in the world of professional sports. It’s kind of a topical nod, as Paris’s own tennis competitors float on by. It’s also proof that “Challengers Summer” is far from over.

Mashable Top Stories

Tweet may have been deleted

Viewers didn’t get to witness the Parisian apartment goings-on, though, as the dancers embraced, looked knowingly into the camera, and then slammed the door shut. No three-way make out sessions on primetime.

NBC’s hosts, exhaling a quiet gasp as the shot took over screens, closed the segment with a succinct wrap up: “Oh — We are uninvited.”

Tweet may have been deleted