Connor Storrie Fooled a Russian Heated Rivalry Extra into Thinking He Was Fluent

-Our next guest is a talented actor you know

from the wildly popular breakout show "Heated Rivalry."

All episodes are streaming now on HBO Max.

Please welcome to the show Connor Storrie, everybody!

[ Cheers and applause ]

♪♪

♪♪

-I'm trying to, like, take it in.

-Yeah, take it in, take it in.

Give it up. [ Cheers and applause ]

-Oh. -I want to -- I want to start by thanking you,

because I was watching the Golden Globes last night,

and you presented there, and I was doing the math

and realizing you had to be here.

So you were on a red-eye last night to join us.

We really appreciate it. -Yep.

I left at probably 8:00 p.m.

and then went to the Chateau Marmont for about 30 minutes.

-Fantastic. Alright. A little -- little after party.

-Yep. Said hello to Parker Posey and then got on a plane --

-That's fantastic. -Yeah.

-Now, I imagine due to the breakthrough,

um, you know, attraction of the show,

it must be nice to be at a Golden Globe party

and be able to say hello to people

that you've been a fan of over the years

that now know who you are. -Yeah. Yeah.

It's, um, it's -- it's definitely weird.

I met your favorite person, Amy Poehler.

-Pretty good person, Amy. -Yeah, she won the --

-[ Indistinct ] -Yeah, she won the, uh,

the first Golden Globe for a podcast, which is really cool.

-Yep, yep. And she was in "Blades of Glory,"

so she's also done skating acting.

-Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. Yeah. -Yeah.

She probably wanted to connect on the skating acting.

-So have you heard of, like, divorced dad movies?

-No. What are divorced dad movies?

-So, me and my friends talk about this all the time.

If you come from a divorced family,

divorced dads have, like, the most raunchy,

irreverent comedies

that seven-year-olds should not be watching, right?

And "Blades of Glory" was one of those really for me.

-Really? -Yes.

-That's fascinating, 'cause I binged "Heated Rivalry"

with my small children and... [ Laughter ]

...I feel like, looking back,

there are some scenes I should have fast-forwarded through.

-Yeah. It's important. It's kind of --

It's like when I was little, my dad made me watch "The Shining"

when I was six because he was like,

"People are gonna reference this.

You need to know this."

And so that's how I imagine it was with "Heated Rivalry."

-That is the most fantastic parenting to show it to you

not 'cause it's a good movie,

but because "I want you to get the jokes."

-Yeah, yeah.

He wanted me to know what people were saying

when they were like, "Here's Johnny!"

You know? -Yeah. And did that help in life?

-1,000. It made me love Shelley Duvall.

-Yeah, that's -- -It made me love Shelley Duvall with the bat like this.

-Yeah. That's fantastic.

She's one of our great bat actors,

while we talk about different -- Uh, no, I want to get to this.

So this show, for those who haven't seen it,

and obviously there are fewer and fewer people every day

who haven't seen it,

um, but this is a love story --

-I thought it was going to end there.

"There are fewer and fewer people every day."

-Every day. I'm sorry to break this,

that's just how it works. -Right.

-People die, Connor.

Your dad obviously didn't tell you.

He was showing you "The Shining."

Uh, no. So, uh, this is a love story set in the world

of professional hockey.

Um, it's just a lovely show.

Like, how -- You must be shocked by the broad appeal of it,

because, you know, it seems when you hear the,

you know, the concept of it initially,

it feels like it might have a narrow audience,

but it feels like everybody's watching it.

It must be so rewarding. -Yeah, yeah.

I mean, I think that anyone can really click

into the idea of love and feeling like, you know,

what's expected of you.

And in this case, it's being a professional hockey player.

Um, I think people can really click into being, like,

how I am, what I want, is not really what's expected of me.

Um, yeah. I was super shocked.

I mean, you think of something like, you know,

male romance and you think just it's for gay men.

But, I mean, there's been all walks of life,

predominantly women, who enjoy it, so...

[ Cheers and applause ] -It's also, you know...

I do think, like, look, media has evolved past a lot

of the easy stereotypes over the years.

And there's been a lot of great examples,

but it's also wonderful to show, like, you know,

you guys are also jocks, right?

Like, you are -- I feel like we're watching a male romance

that maybe we haven't seen, you know, with a few small examples,

and that's kind of what makes it so unique

and obviously one of the reasons

that attracted so many people to it.

-Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, the --

that's -- that was the craziest part for me to play.

Everyone always talks about the Russian,

but the jockness of it all,

I mean, like, trying -- Like, these -- these guys in the NHL,

they have been skating since they were like three years old.

So for Hudson and I to show up

with, like, two weeks of skating training

and being like...

and just kind of waddling like this, like...

it's ridiculous. -It is very funny.

I feel like there are two things

the camera always just cuts right out of.

-Yeah, yeah. -It's like the skates

and, you know, the other thing. -Yeah. Yeah. Yep.

Yeah, I -- Yeah.

I do the other thing. I don't do the skating thing.

-Do you feel a little bit better at skating now?

Because, I mean, it was not -- it was not egregious.

-I'm gonna be honest with you. I thought I was doing good.

Um, and then recently, I think our costume --

one of our costume designers, Hannah,

posted this, like, BTS thing of me skating,

and I watched it, and I was like, "Oh, boy.

Like, I was like, "I don't --

I don't deserve any accolades for this."

I was like... -You're being too hard on yourself.

-No. -It's incredible everything you had to do for the show.

We're not going to give you a hard time on the skating.

Hey, one of my favorite things about, um,

the narrative structure of the show

is it takes place over a long course of this romance.

There's time jumps.

There's title cards for all the time jumps. -Mm-hmm.

-And we've never done this on this show before,

but could we do -- could the next few questions

be with the benefit of a time jump?

-Yeah. -Okay, great.

Uh, so was there anything you shot

that ended up being too salacious to put in the show?

-Uh, yeah. One time...

[ Laughter ]

-Wow!

[ Laughter ]

[ Cheers and applause ]

Whew! Oh.

-I know. Right? -Yeah. That's crazy.

-Yeah. Totally. Totally.

[ Laughter ]

-I'm sorry. I'm just -- I'm still thinking about it.

[ Laughter ]

-Oh, yeah. It, uh, it stays with you.

[ Laughter ]

Do you know what a sex swing is?

-Do I?

[ Laughter ]

[ Applause ]

Hey, great to have you back on the show.

-Yeah. No, I mean, it's -- it's great to be back.

Were you -- I think you were wearing

the same thing last time. -Yeah.

I only own, like, three outfits.

-Yeah. Yeah, I heard that, so I wore the same thing.

-Hey, congrats on your Oscar win.

[ Laughter ]

We'll be right back with more from Connor Storrie!

♪♪

-[ Speaking in Russian ]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-Welcome back. We're here with Connor Storrie, everybody! [ Cheers and applause ]

That was a clip from "Heated Rivalry."

You know, I think there's this very fun thing.

[ Cheers and applause continue ]

Yeah.

When you meet an actor for the first time

watching a show that is their sort of breakout role,

you just assume they are closer to who they're playing

than they are in real life.

Like, I fully just assumed they had found

a Russian-speaking actor for this part.

That is not what happened.

-No. -Yeah.

Did you have any head start on Russian?

-So when I was in high school,

I spent my junior year in France,

and I've always loved languages.

Like, I think if I wasn't an actor or a filmmaker,

I would definitely want to somehow commit

myself to linguistics, but...

So I tried learning the Russian alphabet.

I got super into, like, Russian rap and stuff,

but Russian is so -- it's so impossibly difficult to learn.

-I'm so glad your character didn't rap all their lines. -Yeah. I'm asking Jacob.

I'm like, "You have to give me a Russian, like, little rap part."

-Yeah. I could see that. I could see at least one scene.

Yeah. -Yeah.

"Connor Storrie destroys

everything that was going for him."

-But it sounds like Russian was easier for you

than the skating.

Is that accurate? -Yeah.

I mean, I don't think it was easier for --

I mean, the skating is just --

it's impossible, you know? -Right.

-Like, again, like, I could do it

every single day for 10 years,

and I would never be anywhere close to that.

Um, the Russian was a little bit more immediate

and was a little bit more a part of the show for me.

Um, yeah, so, I mean, I did like four-hour sessions of Russian

every day for like a month and a half.

-And not only -- -Shout-out to Kate.

Kate Yablunovsky. -And is, uh --

Hopefully Kate wasn't the one that was so mean to Emilia.

-No. No, no, no. -Okay. It didn't sound like it.

Seems like Kate might be one of the nice ones.

-She was the good cop. -Yeah, that's great.

-The good cop, bad cop. -Did, uh, you --

Obviously you had to skate in front of people

who I assume, you know, were accomplished skaters.

You also had to speak Russian in front of actual Russian actors. -Yeah.

-What was the feedback they were giving you from scene to scene?

-Yeah. Um, the -- Yeah, oddly enough,

a lot of the scenes that took place in Russia,

almost all of the background were Russian.

Um, the -- the scene where, after my dad's funeral --

spoiler -- um, I -- I'm with my brother.

Uh, everyone at that table was actually Russian,

and so we have like an argument in Russian

in the other room.

And this -- this Russian lady, this older lady,

um, I came back in to reset, and she starts being like...

[ Imitates speaking in Russian ]

And then I'm like, "No, I don't...

[ Laughter ] I don't do that."

And -- And then she told -- she told the person next to her,

she was like...

[ Imitates speaking in Russian ]

Um, and then she was -- this man was like,

"Oh, she thought you were an actual Russian speaker."

-Oh, that's really high praise. -Yeah, but she thought --

But she thought that, like -- she thought that, like,

my parents were Russian and I speak Russian at home with,

like, a pseudo American accent. -Gotcha. Yeah.

It would be funny if every time

somebody spoke to you in Russian,

you just went, "Line?" -Yeah, yeah.

I just always say my go-to.

I always say in Russian, um, "I speak Russian really poorly."

-Well, to know that is helpful. -Yeah.

You grew up in Texas. -Mm-hmm.

-So, uh, what part of Texas are you from?

-Odessa. Represent! -Alright.

[ Cheers and applause ]

So that is, as names go, the most Russian part of Texas.

Yeah. -About. Yeah. Just about.

-So you're kind of.

But was hockey a big part of your...?

I mean, did you ever watch hockey or...?

-Um, I went to one hockey game growing up.

We had the Jackalopes, which is like, uh -- It's --

Yeah, it's a -- it's a rabbit with antlers is their mascot.

-Okay. -And I swear to God,

I thought that was a real thing until about five years ago.

-The jackalope? -Yeah.

I was talking to Sarah, one of your producers,

on the phone, and she mentioned that she knew of the jackalopes,

and then I was like, "So it is a thing?"

Um, she's like, "No, it's not." [ Laughter ]

-Well, that's good.

It's fun to have a role that helps you learn about animals.

-Yeah, and actually one of the -- one of the --

Because we -- we had a few dozen, uh,

professional hockey players that were the teams

and we would kind of just swap out jerseys.

And, um, one of the guys, he played for the Jackalopes

when I was there.

-Oh, really? -Yeah.

So another -- There was another Texan out there.

-Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Well, no, no. He was Canadian, I think.

-Okay. Gotcha. Right. -But he had gone there for --

He'd gone to Odessa 'cause that's

the hockey capital of the world. [ Laughter ]

-Um, you know, I have to imagine

how crazy a whirlwind this has been.

One of the benefits is, you know,

it probably opens doors that weren't available to you before.

Like, what is something that you're hopeful to do with

what I'm assuming is a pretty exciting opportunity for...?

-Yeah. I, uh...

I get that question, and I try to come up with --

I mean, I could probably come up with,

like, a dream role or something,

but, um, I just feel really, really honored.

Um, I've -- I've worked in restaurants for years and years,

literally up until I booked this.

If "Heated Rivalry" did not go this well,

I was already planning on getting

a new job in a few months.

So just to be able to, like,

act and get paid to do what I want to do

and have enough money or resources

to film my own things, like, it's -- it's made.

It's made for me. -Well, very well deserved.

-Truly, this is it. -Very well deserved.

-Yeah. -I think everybody's excited

to know there'll be more "Heated Rivalry" as well.

Hey, thanks so much, Connor.

Congratulations on everything. -Thank you, thank you.

-Really lovely to meet you. Hey, everybody.

That's Connor Storrie.

All six episodes of "Heated Rivalry"

are streaming now on HBO Max.

We'll be right back.