Jacob Tierney Created Smash Hit “Heated Rivalry”—Then Wrote a Book About It

The creator of “Heated Rivalry” talks to IndieWire about his scriptwriting process, breaks down key scenes and shares deleted moments ahead of the release of the in-depth screenplay book “I Will Believe in Anything.”

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Jacob Tierney is a very busy man. He's just landed a new set, his lunch delivery is gone, and he's about to enter months of production on one of the year's most popular shows, Hot Rivalry. But right now, there's one thing on his mind: Shane and Illya.

Before Hot Rivalry became a global sensation, it existed as six Tierney-penned screenplays based on Rachel Reid's quirky ice hockey novel. The hit movie Crave depicts the captivating love story of rival players, Russian prodigy Ilya Rozanov (Connor Story) and Canadian golden boy Shane Hollander (Hudson Williams). A mix of toxic masculinity, seductive passion and hidden love, the series will have fans clamoring for a piece of the show, whether it's a Team Canada movie or a soundtrack cassette. Related Stories 'There'll Never Be Another Like RJ Mitte': Co-Stars Remember Late 'Breaking Bad' Star VisionQuest Review: Marvel's boring bad-dad drama series ends a short-lived run of MCU TV.

The latest release is "I'll Believe Anything," a collection of annotated scripts and exclusive behind-the-scenes content that gives fans insight into how the show is made. In essence, "I'll Believe in Something" is the bible for "Hot Rivalry" fans.

A few days into August, just as the gears begin to kick into production on Season 2, the "Hot Rivalry" creator, writer and director sat down with IndieWire for an in-depth interview about his writing process.

Tierney framed the memory for his adaptation of the hockey romance that spans more than a decade. "It's everywhere, but especially at the beginning when the memory goes dark. To me, it was like everything they remember is with each other.

He gives the example that if Shane had been asked about the world's first teenagers, he would have replied, “Oh, I met Elijah, I saw him in this tunnel. He was smoking, which was crazy. Everything in this way is related to the other party.

This notion of memory operating with dreamlike logic anchors the narrative, but also allows Tierney to move through the years with speed and clarity. At one point, Tierney tried to fill in the gaps in time, but soon found it unnecessary.

This is evident in the opening scene of the script: the couple's awkward and beautiful meeting was technically the 11th scene, but after reassembling and simplifying the play's opening beats, he jumped right into the action. "One of the things about that scene is that they don't say anything and Shane is becoming Mr. Polite Boy, like, 'How are your parents?' Do you miss Christmas? "Oh, my God, who cares?" Tierney said with a laugh.

With the interweaving of memory comes reflection and imagination. Check out the scene where episode 4 ends, with Shane having sex with Rose and Illya masturbating in the shower. This sequence has sparked debates: are these photos real or do they live in each other's imaginations? "To me, both are solutions," Tierney said. Shane thinks of Elijah and Elijah thinks of Shane. This is the moment of understanding that their obsession is mutual and they also have different ideas about what the other person is living. "They think that the other side is somehow threatening them."

Another central tenet of Tierney's screenplays is that dialogue is not just communicating internalized thoughts, but body movement. Tierney explained that it was important to capture the character's voice and personality through physicality: beyond the sex scenes, there is Shane's tense and restrained body against Illya's Slavic stare.

"The little physical moments are huge," Tierney said. The tension between dialogue and action reveals the conflict between the head and the heart. Wide shots give the body space to express that silent connection. "You reveal everything in the way you move, in the way you see someone moving in the world. Acting is deeply physical, and I think good writing is also because dialogue is often a way of talking about something, and the body doesn't lie, not the other way around."

Other revelations from the script book include deleted scenes, including the scene where Elijah plans to meet Shane's parents, Yuna and David (played by Christina Chung and Dylan Walsh) outside his fellow hockey player's hospital room in episode 5, instead of at the end of episode 6. I liked the moment at first, but I didn't need it.

So what is Tierney's criteria for turning a scene into "hot competition"? The main scenes are Shane and Ilya. Everything else is allowed to be left out." "There's a rawness to the storytelling, a focus that's not very TV, more like a movie about a relationship," he said. If it's about Shane and Elijah, it drives the story forward because the story is how they feel about each other."

The final episode of "Hot Rivalry" has two major emotional waves: a coming-out scene and an "I love you" confession. Interestingly, Tierney treated them very differently. The script book shows the original scene between Shane and Yuna, which Tierney rewrote on the set. "It started raining, so we couldn't finish it," Tierney said, recalling the decision. I was just like, "I don't like this, this doesn't work." When two actors are that good and they don't work, it's my fault. I basically started it halfway through; That's talking too much about something."

While Tierney wanted the exit scene to be brief in dialogue, elsewhere in Episode 6 he enjoys slowing down and letting the dialogue flow. The epitome of that confession is the "I love you" that unfolds in several scenes in the shelter of Shane's cabin.

I prefer to write like this. "I don't like conversations to happen quickly, it makes me feel like I'm watching a crap show." Tierney laughs. "At the cottage, they just have to be. They do a lot of things, and now we have to see them. What I added and loved the most was them on the couch, both on their phones. They do what normal couples do, and Shane and Illya are like, “I can't believe we're sitting on the same couch and like, damn going to Instagram circles. This is amazing. "This is the best thing that has ever happened to me."

The scripts also show Tierney laying the groundwork for a second season.

For example, ice hockey players Ryan Price and Eric Bennett from Reed's novels were originally supposed to appear. The former was mentioned in passing and the latter was discontinued. "We've been talking about Ryan Price all the time, but there's a time and a place for that," Tierney said.

True to his word, a few weeks after our interview, Daniel Deemer was announced as Ryan for Season 2. Bartender Kyle Swift (Matthew Finlan), who appears briefly in season 1 but is fully present. The bold character arc in Reed's book "Common Purpose" was another easter egg for fans. "Casting Kyle was very important because there's a world where he has his own show or it's moving forward," Tierney said.

The producer adds that it was difficult to find the right actor for just one scene: "Matthew is a really, really good actor. But how many times can we get that lucky if we only read people for one scene? It seems too hard and not worth it."

Writing six scripts alone is part of the experience. The other takes those pages on the set. Tierney's scripts are precisely crafted, and so it's telling when the creator allows the actor to embellish his writing. By the second half of filming, he recalls, his actors had become "department heads for each character." Tierney noted that this is especially true in later episodes where the actors bring these characters to life with lived-in nuances.

While the physical action was heavily scripted and rehearsed, some fan-favorite quotes from the cast emerged that embodied the characters they've come to know: Story's "I'm sorry" when Illya breaks down in front of Shane and the iconic "gimme kiss." Similarly, Hiccup Williams' line "Better" in the hospital with Elijah holding his hand was not written.

"People are like, 'That's improvement.' Improvement is one thing, but I chose to use it. "Actors make offers; you take the offer or not. I want a set where people are comfortable enough to do that, especially in the cottage. That was the last thing we shot. I was like, 'These are your characters, you can decide for them.' I like to hear what I wrote, but let me breathe. to draw, to add something, to add a pause that I did not expect."

Tierney continued: "The invitation is to surprise me, because even though I wrote it and I'm directing it, there's a lot, there's a lot I haven't thought of. It's a good thing to give someone a role and say, 'You're the boss of this department.' What do you think [your character] is doing here and why?'

A lot of love has been given to "Rivalry," and many wax lyrical about why the show has been such a hit: the casting, the male intimacy, and the love-rival plot. However, the release of I'll Believe Anything is a reminder that the greatest qualities of a strong book-to-page adaptation include respect for the original text and respect for the characters.

From Little, Brown and Company, "I'll Believe in Anything" is on sale now.