I knew Heated Rivalry was a certified hit; however, that was emphasized big time when Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper brought it up on their New Year’s Eve broadcast, not once, but multiple times. That’s right, these two mentioned the beloved, smutty, queer hockey show on during CNN’s broadcast on multiple different occasions. Now, the show’s creator and cast, as well as the books’ author, have shared their A+ reactions to being a big part of kicking off the 2026 TV schedule with the broadcasters.
As per usual, Cooper and Cohen's New Year’s Eve broadcast was unhinged in the best way. The journalist did a dramatic reading of Taylor Swift’s song “Wood,” both of them had puppets of themselves, and they mentioned Heated Rivalry (which you can stream with an HBO Max subscription) quite a few times.
At one point, Cohen and Cooper were discussing who was Ilya and Shane of the two of them. While the Bravo personality said he was Shane, and the journalist was Ilya, Cooper had to disagree with him. Rather than opting to relate to the two lead characters, he said he’s much more like the smoothie maker Kip, who is a supporting character at the center of Episode 3’s love story as he falls in love with star hockey player Scott. It was hilarious, and author Rachel Reid thought so too, as she reposted the moment with the following reaction on her IG story:
Along with Reid posting her thoughts about this hilarious interaction, Robbie G.K., who plays Kip on Heated Rivalry, responded too. He commented on Evan Ross Katz’s post about Cooper saying he was the most like Kip with the following statement:
[Anderson Cooper] right answer king 👏🏼
What a fabulous reaction! However, the fun does not end there.
When Stephen Colbert appeared on the broadcast, his wife, Evie, also made a cameo. As Cooper and Choen joked with them, the Watch What Happens Live host said that Colbert’s wife was “the top of their relationship.” In response, The Late Show host said he’s “a bossy bottom.” That made Anderson Cooper lose it, and while laughing, he asked, “Has Heated Rivalry made everybody insane?”
This was the moment Jacob Tierney, the show’s creator, director, writer and executive producer, reacted to on Instagram. Posting screenshots of the three men during this hilarious interaction, he simply used an emoji to perfectly encapsulate his feelings about this situation:
At the time of this writing, Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams, who play Ilya and Shane, respectively, have not responded to this wild broadcast. However, if they do, there’s more for them to react to. That’s because, along with the aforementioned comments, Cooper and Cohen also asked Brandi Carlile if lesbians like Heated Rivalry, and she said it was all she could think about.
So, as you can see, this book-to-screen adaptation has quite the hold on pop culture, seeing as it was brought up multiple times on New Year’s Eve and was met with tons of hilarious reactions from fans and people who work on the show. As Evan Ross Katz’s post noted, it’s like we’re in “collective psychosis” with this wonderful romance, and clearly, Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen are bewitched by it too.
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