Taylor Zakhar Perez Sees ‘Heated Rivalry’s Similarities With ‘Red, White & Royal Blue’: “A Really Beautiful Story”

As LGBTQ romantasy fans await more Heated Rivalry and Red, White & Royal BlueTaylor Zakhar Perez sees the similarities in the franchises.

The actor, who plays the U.S. president’s son Alex Claremont-Diaz in Prime Video’s upcoming Red, White & Royal Weddingadmitted he’s “seen a few episodes” of the Crave/HBO Max series adaptation of Rachel Reid’s Game Changers books.

“I haven’t really thought about it,” he told GQ of whether the show’s success made him think of his own hit movie adaptation of Casey McQuiston’s 2019 book. “I saw a lot of the same elements of Red, White in Heated Rivalry. I think they work so well because it wasn’t just about sex, it was so much about intimacy—and we crave intimacy because it’s a lot less fleeting than sex is.”

Perez added, “I think they told a really beautiful story over a long period of time. That made it very universal. Anyone can watch it and relate to that type of longing that you have for somebody—maybe it’s like a forbidden love—and what you have to do to either overcome that hurdle or just crash into each other and say yes.”

The sequel to Red, White & Royal Blue was first announced in May 2024, with Perez teasing that he expects to begin filming in 2026.

Meanwhile, after Heated Rivalry was renewed for Season 2, creator Jacob Tierney told Deadline that it will be based on The Long Gamethe only other current book in the series that focuses on Ilya and Shane (Reid’s Unrivaled resumes the story on Sept. 29). Star Connor Storrie has since teased that production on the sophomore season could start by summer.