Stephen Curry Hosts the Ultimate At-Home Competition for Athletes

Every star athlete in this tournament hosted by Steph Curry, and streaming now on the two-time NBA MVP’s YouTube channel, enjoys home field advantage.

That’s because they battle against one another from their respective homes, competing in events such as laundry hamper hoops (dunking dirty clothes instead of basketball), rubbish relays (hauling trash bins stuffed with eggs) and high jumps (over pillows, furniture and stacks of toilet paper).

The roster features Brooklyn Nets center DeAndre Jordan, Denver Broncos wide receiver Von Miller, World Cup ski champion Lindsey Vonn, boxer Ryan Garcia, wrestler Ronda Rousey, former soccer stars Jeremy Lynch and Billy Wingrove (aka The F2) and social media influencer Kris London.

This trailer breaks it down:

Wow, those multimillionaire sports celebs are just like us when they get home. Sort of. And they’ve got really nice houses!

Along with Curry, a three-time NBA champion point guard with the Golden State Warriors, commentators include Fortnite streamer Ninja, ESPN host Katie Nolan and Saturday Night Live cast member Ego Nwodim.

Here’s the complete 50-minute “Ultimate Home Championship,” which dropped on Friday, produced by Portal A and Curry’s Unanimous Media as a fundraiser for World Health Organization’s Covid-19 Solidarity Response Fund:

So far, the show has garnered nearly 500,000 views.

“We set out to make something for sports fans who are desperate for live competition,” says Portal A executive producer and co-founder Nate Houghteling. “There are a lot of those people out there, including us.”

Curry and Portal A have teamed up before, most notably on the star’s “5 Minutes From Home” YouTube series. Below, Houghteling chats with Muse about the new project.

Muse: Where did idea for the “Ultimate Home Championship” come from?

Nate Houghteling: With every professional league on hiatus and most of the country on lockdown, we’re all starved for some competition. We had the idea of a sporting event where professional athletes and other personalities would compete from the safety and comfort of their own homes. We developed the idea with Stephen Curry and his team and then ultimately with our amazing partners at YouTube Originals. It’s part of their slate of Covid-19 programming, all designed to raise money for front-line workers.

How were the stars recruited?

Stephen was a natural choice for host. His channel, which we’ve built with his team over the course of the last three years, is one of the most popular on YouTube, and he’s become the face of professional athletes on the platform in many ways. For the competitor set, we wanted a mix of athletes from different sports and leagues—competitors in the purest sense, who we thought would have fun with this premise.

Can you talk about the process of making the show?

Producing something at this scale entirely remotely is a massive undertaking. Luckily, our head of production Elyse Preiss, also an executive producer on the project, wrote the book on how to approach them in a way that sacrifices neither production quality nor safety. We began by sending detailed instructions to the talent ahead of filming, [telling them] exactly how the day would go and what they needed to prepare. We collaborated with them on this piece, so that we all went into the shoot with a clear plan. Each shoot was filmed using multiple cameras, with static GoPros capturing wide shots and a higher-end camera on a gimbal. This allowed us to cover the challenges just as you would cover typical sporting events, capturing many angles at once.

You coordinated the shoots off-site?

We filmed the special over the course of 11 remote shoots. Each shoot was directed remotely over Zoom. The finals between Ryan Garcia and the F2 were the only challenges that were filmed simultaneously. Our edit team took all these shoots and stitched them together into a continuous special.

Any big surprises arise during filming?

Luckily, all of the surprises were good surprises—like how much these pro athletes actually wanted to win and got very competitive about it. Ronda Rousey definitely put on a show. She loves her smoke machine!

CREDITS

Executive Producers
NATE HOUGHTELING
KAI HASSON
ZACH BLUME
ELYSE PREISS
STEPHEN CURRY
ERICK PEYTON
JERON SMITH
 
Directed By  
JACKSON ADAMS
LEX HALABY
KAI HASSON
 
Producer  
BRAD SIMPSON

Co-Producer
MOLLY ORTIZ

Associate Producers  
ARIF ZAMAN
MEG SCHMIDT
ALICE SCHROEDER
BRITTANI KAGAN
 
Written By  
JACKSON ADAMS
LEX HALABY
KAI HASSON
SAM JACKSON

Casting By
JEN PROCTOR
ABIGAIL PARSONS
STEPHANIE PEPPER

Edited By  
DRIGAN LEE
ARTURO MORALES
ADRIÁN MORALES RAMOS

Music By  
KUSH MODY

Graphics and Visual Effects By  
BUBBA’S LA

Starring  
STEPHEN CURRY

With
RYAN GARCÍA
DEANDRE JORDAN
KRISTOPHER LONDON
VON MILLER
KATIE NOLAN
TYLER “NINJA” BEVINS
EGO NWODIM
RONDA ROUSEY
THE F2
LINDSEY VONN
 
Director of Photography  
ALAN GWIZDOWSKI

Production Designer  
JEN DUNLAP

Camera Operators  (left side)
TOMAS CUTTS
JUSTIN JUNG
BEN MOLYNEUX
JASON NAWARA

Camera Operators
KYLE NIGELS
JESSIE STOCKWELL
MARK UPSON

Key Office Production Assistant  
SHERRY SHI

Production Assistants  
MAYNARD VIRGIL
RONALD WITT III

Color Correction  
AARON HAYDEN

Sound Design & Mix  
MICHAEL O’CONNOR
CODY SKULLY

Post Supervisor
ARTURO MORALES

Additional Editorial
THOMAS EMMET ASHTON
MIKE IMMERMAN

Additional Design By  
ANGELA CHANG

Assistant Editors  
BEE RHODES
MYSTIKAL SCALZI

Business Operations  
ROBYN BUENSUCESO

Production Accountant  
BRETT BERTANI