rundown
Hudson Williams and Connor Storey served as official torchbearers on January 25th.
The two actors will star in HBO’s “Heat Rivalry.”
This popular series has dramatically increased the popularity of both characters.
On Sunday, Hudson Williams and Connor Storey walked across Italy as official torchbearers for the Winter Olympics.
The “Rivals” co-stars walked through the town of Feltre as part of the 49th leg of the torch relay. The tournament’s official Instagram account shared a photo of two actors wearing Olympic-branded jerseys smiling and holding lit torches aloft. It was dusk in a small European town.
“🏑🔥 Olympic Torch + Hudson Williams and Connor Story as Torchbearers = Absolute Cinema 🎬 #MilanoCortina2026 #Olympics #TorchRelay2026 #Feltre,” the caption reads.
They also shared a clip in their story of the two walking on a wet road, surrounded by fans and Olympic officials.
In Heat Rivalry, Williams and Story are pitted against Shane and Elijah, two hockey players from rival teams who have been in an illicit relationship for almost a decade. In one key plot point, the two attend the Olympics in Russia. It’s where Ilya comes from, and it’s a particularly dangerous place to reveal their relationship.
The two actors are very close as friends and have made numerous public appearances with each other since the show’s height of popularity. At the recent Golden Globe Awards, the two presented awards together and sat next to each other in the audience.
“Hudson is my best friend and I literally can’t imagine doing this without him,” Storey told W magazine in December. “Up until now, we’ve been in similar positions in life. We both quit our jobs within a day of each other. We booked this time and left the same day. Now we’re two people who are getting international attention for the first time. This was a highlight of my life, and meeting Hudson made it ten times sweeter.”
