In the weeks since Heated Rivalry catapulted Hudson Williams into the upper echelons of celebrity, I’ve become convinced that his 24 hours must be longer than my 24 hours. It’s been a little less than two months since the show’s finale and, in that time, the Canadian actor has presented at the Golden Globes, met with world leaders, attended two fashion weeks (plus hosted a hell of a party), carried the Olympic torch, and done more interviews than I can count on two hands—possibly even three. All the while, fans have speculated about how he would approach what has become an increasingly shrewd fame-o-meter metric for rising stars: Which luxury fashion brand would officially partner with Williams first? (For example, his Heated Rivalry co-star, Connor Storrie, recently inked an exclusive deal with Saint Laurent.)
Now, Williams is joining the ranks as an official “Friend of the House” of Balenciaga, with a debut appearance in creative director Pierpaolo Piccioli’s first campaign for the label.
“Balenciaga paired with Pierpaolo was a no-brainer,” Williams exclusively tells GQ via email. “Their history of inventing new silhouettes mixed with Pierpaolo’s bold designs and taste really excited me and felt like a great fit.”
A no-brainer to some, perhaps, though the actor certainly made other fashion inroads prior to Balenciaga: He wore Giorgio Armani to the Globes, walked the Dsquared2 runway and made a highly publicized stop at Armani’s fall 2026 show during Milan Fashion Week, and co-hosted a NYFW bash with designers Prabal Gurung, Kim Shui, and Bach Mai last week. But he’s in good company in Balenciaga’s “Heart and Body” campaign, which was shot by photographer David Sims and also features established brand ambassadors like Winona Ryder and Harris Dickinson, as well as fellow new “Friends of the House” Havana Rose Liu, Labrinth, Danielle Deadwyler, and more.
Though Williams was just in New York late last week, he is currently in Canada to begin shooting a new project. When asked to describe this new project, he replied with a single word: “Freaky.” Whether it’s freaky in a “Shane and Ilya at the cottage” way or a “This is actually, like, weird” way remains to be seen; the actor was tight-lipped (or rather, light-fingered) on sharing further details about the script. But he did share what he looks for when choosing his roles now.
“It starts with the script, and comes down to the director/creator,” he says. “No actor can turn shit writing into something great. And at the end of the day, a subpar director can butcher a good performance—and even a good script if they’re really bad—by fumbling the movie at so many points along the way.”
(This, historically speaking, is not something Heated Rivalry fans need to worry about. Although creator Jacob Tierney announced late last year that he had yet to start working on scripts for season two, Williams is already looking ahead for Shane Hollander’s arc: “I want to see what Shane looks like when he comes into himself and moves away from fear and stifling of his emotions,” the actor says.)
With Williams embarking on his new project so soon after wrapping up a truly whirlwind round of Heated Rivalry press—and performing a pretty damn impressive balancing act of all the adjacent obligations along the way—one has to wonder how he’s staying sane these days. “My time and energy is my biggest luxury now and both can be taken away from me pretty quick so it’s important to guard both with a strict priority list,” he says. “I’ve always been most zen with the calm arts like reading, writing, and drawing/painting. Watercolor right now [because] I’m too lazy to clean up anything else.”
Plus, he adds: “You always hear about people thinking X, Y, and Z are gonna solve their issues, and then they get it and nothing’s fixed. But truly, nothing externally gained unfucks your mental state.”
Wrapping up his email, Williams signed off with a few parting words of advice.
“Be kind to yourself, be diligent, fix your shit, and stay sexy.”