{"id":755547,"date":"2026-08-31T11:56:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T11:56:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/755547\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T11:56:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T11:56:09","slug":"us-open-2026-thea-frodin-follows-in-serena-williams-footsteps-after-playing-idol-in-king-richard-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/755547\/","title":{"rendered":"US Open 2026: Thea Frodin follows in Serena Williams’ footsteps after playing idol in ‘King Richard’ film"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thea Frodin once played a young Serena Williams on the big screen. Now, the teenager is ready to follow in the American great’s footsteps at the US Open.<\/p>\n

Five years ago, Frodin was chosen as a tennis-playing body double for the actress cast as her childhood idol in the Oscar-nominated film ‘King Richard’.<\/p>\n

That involved the then 12-year-old working alongside actor Will Smith as he portrayed Richard Williams, the father of sisters Serena and Venus.<\/p>\n

“Being able to play the role of somebody that I looked up to for my whole life was super special,” Frodin told the WTA website., external<\/a><\/p>\n

“I was honoured. She was one of the players that I looked up to most, just when I was starting to play.<\/p>\n

“She’s such an inspiration to me.”<\/p>\n

Now, Frodin will make her main-draw singles debut at her home Grand Slam, where Serena and Venus will this year team up in the doubles.<\/p>\n

To make the occasion even more special, she has been drawn against world number two Elena Rybakina, a two-time major winner and the reigning Australian Open champion.<\/p>\n

“I’m trying to stay in the moment as much as possible,” said Frodin. <\/p>\n

“This is a huge opportunity for me to enjoy the moment, have fun and see what I can do. <\/p>\n

“The atmosphere, how loud the crowd will be, I feel like I fit well in that environment.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thea Frodin once played a young Serena Williams on the big screen. Now, the teenager is ready to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":755548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-755547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}