Valentine’s Gold: Virtue and Moir

If you’ve heard about Tess a Virtue and Scott Moir, it’s because the entire world is talking about Canada’s sexiest figure-skating couple who just won Gold in Pyeongchang.

Their routine was so hot and steamy, even SNL’s Leslie Jones felt the heat, tweeting “how on earth is it possible that these two are “just friends”?”

Yet, Virtue insists that what they have is nothing more than a professional partnership. She says that the on-ice chemistry that everyone sees is just them doing their job well, and that outside the rink what they have is just a “cool” relationship.

In the film industry, that’s called “good acting”.

Leo and Kate

I was involved in the distribution of the feature blockbuster Titanic in France. That film also won gold in 1998, earning $2.18 Billion in Box Office receipts worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film to date. That gold was undoubtedly and primarily due to the scalding on-screen chemistry between the two protagonists. Every girl in the world wanted to be Rose (and some guys wanted to be Jack!).

But the couple’s extraordinary romance never tipped over into real life. Outside the sets, DiCaprio and Winslet are just, and have always been just, good friends. In real life she seems to prefer older men and he younger model types!

A great couple’s performance – whether in sport or entertainment - requires two elements: great acting chops and a real-life chemistry. After Titanic, DiCaprio only ever demonstrated impressively terrible chemistry with famously beautiful women (think Carey Mulligan in The Great Gatsby, Marion Cotillard in Inception, or Claire Danes in Romeo + Juliet).

But when 10 years later he reprised his role of Winslet’s lover in Revolutionary Road, their chemistry sizzled once again. During her best actress acceptance speech at the Golden Globes, she thanked Leo more profusely than she did her (now ex) husband Sam Mendes who directed the film.

For the past hundred years, avid fans have been grasping at straws to make their dream come true. But more often than not, the on-screen - and on-ice - clues are nothing more than friendly affection. According to Winslet, that real-life chemistry is what makes DiCaprio her “closest friend in the world”, while Virtue and Moir refer to each other as “best friends who think the world of one another.”