Bella Thorne Says She and Zendaya Were ‘Pitted Against’ Each Other on ‘Shake It Up’

Bella Thorne’s friendship with Zendaya may have been formed during their time starring on Shake It Up, but it didn’t start off effortlessly. Thorne, who played CeCe on the Disney Channel show opposite Zendaya as Rocky from 2010 to 2013 told Us Weekly Wednesday that the two had to have an honest conversation at a young age about being forced to compete with one another on the set in order to overcome their problems.

“We had to deal with [being pit against one another] so much on Shake It Up,” the “Shake It” singer told the outlet. “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.”

Everything changed for the pair when they were filming an episode of Good Luck Charlie in a Disney Channel crossover and had a “beautiful talk in the middle of a sound stage,” Thorne recalled. “We were really able to put our cards out on the table and understanding each other,” she explained, saying she was impressed at how they were “so young and so mature at such a young age.”

Now, the two have nothing but love for one another as they make their own careers post-Disney. “Zendaya’s amazing. I f—ing love her,” Thorne gushed of her former co-star, who recently won an Emmy for her role on HBO’s Euphoria. “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.” When people compare the two, Thorne says she gets confused at what their motives are. “Why are you doing this? Is it just because we’re women?” she asked. Handling that kind of dynamic, Thorne said the best advice is to “block it out and just don’t even listen to the noise.”

Thorne has been focusing on her music career as of late and is dropping her song and music video for “Shake It” Friday. The singer has been giving sneak peeks of the video on her social media over the past week, teasing that she’ll have some pretty steamy scenes with adult star Abella Danger involved.