Zendaya and Bella Thorne Overcame the Pressure to Compete and Became Best Friends After Filming 'Shake It Up'
Disney alums Zendaya and Bella Thorne were once pitted against one another when they starred in "Shake It Up" in the early 2010s. In an exclusive interview with J-17, Thorne admitted the raging competition between the two stars while filming. "Zendaya and I were put in a very unfortunate position where we were kind of forced to compete against each other during 'Shake It Up,' which made the whole first season of the show just very awkward for us. We wanted to love each other, but yet we were constantly being put against each other. It was, 'Who's better at this?' and 'Who's better at that?'"
The Disney sitcom "Shake it Up" followed the lives of CeCe Jones (played by Bella Thorne) and Rocky Blue (played by Zendaya) as background dancers on a local show.
According to US Weekly, the "Blended" actress shared that during the filming of the first season, the two stars were not on good terms due to extreme performance pressure. "We had to deal with that so much on 'Shake It Up.' It's like we said in a couple interviews when we were younger, how we explained how in the first season we weren't friends and it took us those other two seasons of becoming so close. It was hard not having someone pitted against you before and then all of a sudden, now everyone is pitting you against each other. That fed into our heads. It made us not be friends in that first season."
However, they connected on an emotional level during season two and ended up becoming best friends, the "Midnight Sun" actor revealed. "And then second season, we kind of just had this tell-all talk where we started crying and really just put everything out there on the table, and that's when we became best friends." According to Thorne, the magic moment happened during a "beautiful talk in the middle of a sound stage" as they filmed an episode of "Good Luck Charlie," a former Disney Channel series.
Expressing her views over their former "frenemies kinda" situation, the "Time is Up" star revealed, "I feel like when people put us against each other, it’s just like, 'Why are you doing this? Is it just because we're women?'"
The adorable besties went on to guest star on "K.C. Undercover" and they still remain in touch. "We text each other all the time, and we're always sending photos back and forth. Being on set with her again was awesome, just to have my Z back, and to see how much she's changed and how some of the things that I used to say, now she's saying. It's so weird, but I love it!"
Thorne has nothing but praise for her best friend. "Zendaya's amazing. I f—king love her," she shared. "She's always been amazing and she's always going to be amazing. I'm just happy that people see that. She's getting the recognition she deserves. That just makes me so happy."
