WHY JONATHAN AND DREW CAN’T STOP COMPETING
Life&style EXCLUSIVE
They’d come to promote their new book, It Takes Two: Our Story. But as they joked, played games and took questions for more than two hours onstage at the Bergen Performing Arts Center in Englewood, N. J., on Sept. 5, Property Brothers stars Jonathan and Drew Scott seemed more interested in having a good time than selling anything. “We didn’t want to do a regular book tour,” said Drew, who climbed onto a woman’s lap at one point and took selfies with the cheering crowd. “We [wanted] to throw a house party with 2,000 of our closest friends!”
The identical twins clearly enjoy each other’s company. But as with all families, things can get complicated. Now Drew and Jonathan, 39, are exclusively opening up to Life & Style about their sibling rivalry — and revealing it gets more heated than their fans know. “We’re always competing,” Drew tells Life & Style. “There’s a ton of competition.” But Jonathan insists his brother is the instigator and says their battles go way beyond the renovation wars we see on Brother vs. Brother. “Drew is the most competitive man alive,” Jonathan tells Life & Style, noting that they’ve locked horns over everything from their hectic work schedule to pingpong. “When I beat him [at pingpong] on our fan cruise last year,” Jonathan taunts, “he just about jumped overboard!”
SQUABBLES AND SUPPORT
There was almost a Scott brothers showdown on Season 25 of Dancing With the Stars. Producers originally wanted them to go head-to-head on the competition series, Jonathan reveals. But in the end, only Drew got tapped. “Jonathan is jealous. Oh, he totally is!” Drew teases. “He would’ve loved to have been on the show.”
But competitiveness has its limits. Drew says Jonathan ultimately decided not to do DWTS so his bro could shine. And Jonathan was worried they were spreading themselves too thin. “We’re just starting [new seasons of] two of our shows, Property Brothers and Buying and Selling, which means we have 17 reno projects we’re about to start, and he kind of has to hold the fort on that side of it while I’m doing this,” explains Drew, adding that doing DWTS also allows him to learn new moves for his upcoming wedding to fiancée Linda Phan. “I’m lucky I
have that support. DWTS is something Jonathan’s excited for me to do.”
Still, it’s Drew’s penchant for overbooking himself that leads the twins to bicker most. “Drew is a workaholic and takes every waking moment of downtime to find something to work on,” laments Jonathan. “I think that’s overkill.”
Jonathan says he believes in a “work hard, play hard” motto. And he wants to teach his brother to do both on yet another reality show — one where they can compete on the same team. “I think Drew and I would be great on the Amazing Race,” he says. “We’re very experienced travelers and highly resourceful!”
Identical twins, best friends and beloved HGTV stars Jonathan and Drew Scott confess to Life & Style that they spar constantly — but always put family first