Interview with Ryan M. Murphy (Hallmark Movie Producer)

[00:00:03] This is a Bramble Jam Podcast Hi, I'm Brian and I love Hallmark Movies I'm Dan and I despise Hallmark Movies And I'm Ryan, I'm a producer who also is a big podcast fan And this is Deck The Hallmark Podcast Deck The Hallmark Podcast Friends host his podcast

[00:00:32] We hope you like this jolly podcast Wow, wow, wow Hello everybody, welcome to another episode Another interview I think Dan, this might be our first interview with a producer An executive producer And poor Ryan Murphy has to just say Ryan

[00:01:00] And probably deals with the joke on every podcast he's ever on That he's not the other Ryan Murphy, right? Like we have to start there, don't we Ryan? Every time I start anything Actors show up very excited to meet him They very quickly realize, oh, that guy Yeah, it's the better Ryan, it's Ryan M. Murphy That's right That's right That's exactly right

[00:01:26] Who has probably had a hand in some of your favorite Hallmark movies of all time That's true It is true That's true My two favorite Hallmark movies of all time Both produced by Ryan M. Murphy at the executive level But I'm not going to talk about a winning team or the groomsmen I'm here to talk about Round and Round and Ghosts of Christmas Always Do you know what I mean? So Ryan, I'm thrilled to have you here, man I'm thrilled to be here I'm thrilled to be here I'm thrilled to be talking to you guys

[00:01:53] And I am telling you, especially Dan, I'm here to take the shots I'm here to say, we have all those times in the thousands of podcasts You guys, I said, why did you? It's like, I'm here to answer as well as I can Wow And I'm going to try to have the answers behind the curtain What a guy to just be here and be like, yeah, that's fine You can pick these things apart I do want to start with just a general overview of what you do

[00:02:23] I think there's a lot of people that watch movies and see producers and executive producers And sometimes there's like a thousand of them, it seems like And somehow the actors are now also exec What is an executive producer? What do you do in the grand scheme of the creating of the movie? I like to compare myself now when it comes to Hallmark An executive producer, well, on a feature film

[00:02:50] The producer is the top of the food chain, the producer On a TV movie, unlike on a Hallmark movie The executive producer basically fills that role There can always be 30 of them But for the most part, the EP is the one who basically builds the house The best analogy I like to give when it comes to Hallmark is I'm their wedding planner They're the bride, I'm the planner And we want to make sure that we're fulfilling the bride's wishes And delivering what they want on their special day

[00:03:18] And everybody has their own taste and their own opinion and all these things But it's just like I'm there to facilitate making that movie For that specific client, which is Hallmark So I'm basically the one planner So I have to, like so many questions, Ryan But I have to start with how do you get into this? Like this is not, you know, you have some other credits But for the better part of a decade, eight years You've been the top of the food chain At pound for pound

[00:03:48] Some of the most memorable Hallmark movies For eight years So how do you get into this role? How do you slide into being the go-to executive producer For Hallmark movies? It's very nice of you to say I don't want to say I'll blame COVID But COVID played a role I did my first movie with this great producer Named Steve Stabler Who's made 200 movies Wow He made Dumb and Dumber and Kingpin And just literally 200 movies Wow So he had a relationship with Hallmark initially

[00:04:17] So I went in with him and did the first movie And then from there, I did a few more And then COVID hit And I was the single guy with a dog Who wasn't afraid to quarantine for COVID So I went back to Vancouver At the end of May 2020 Quarantined Then did like three movies And they said Do you want to go here? Do you want to go there? And then they just kept shipping me everywhere And I wasn't going to say no Because it was great to be working

[00:04:47] And that's basically the core reason That I've stayed as busy I think as I have Which is very fortunate And who, like I'm assuming you don't work for Hallmark But you have your own company That then Hallmark hires to create these movies But still under their umbrella And there's different ways that that plays out Sometimes Hallmark's totally removed Sometimes Hallmark is very involved In the process of the movie

[00:05:16] But what is your current role? Like do you have your own company? And then Hallmark calls you up and says Hey, we have a movie Or do you say Hey, I have a movie And I think it's going to be great for you Right now it's a little bit of both If they're in a pinch And they need a producer to leave tomorrow Then they know 99 times out of 100 That I'll be on a plane It's just like Sure, I'll go tomorrow Again, because I'm fortunate right now To be flexible

[00:05:44] But then there are like The passion projects that Of course I always want to try to make And try to figure out how to do So I'll go in and pitch them specifically Or team up with Writers, directors, actors of course And go in and pitch movies that way So should I just assume All the ones I like were passion projects And all the ones I didn't were I'm on a plane tomorrow? The answer is yes Because they were someone's passion project This guy I love it Those specifically

[00:06:14] I mean to address them Those were both Kate Redinger Executive at Hallmark Who's, you know Very close with After the Over the years And you know Like She's got amazing taste There's taste And there's trust And then there's execution And all these things That kind of come together And you guys You know You're in production You're making podcasts You know what it's like When you have guests come in And I'm just really fortunate

[00:06:44] Because Kate always trusted me And I could then trust her And I just give it to her straight Most important thing Is just giving it to people straight This is what's happening What should we do? Yeah, I love that And I do want to ask One question Before we Because I think We're going to have A ton of questions About the Hallmark world All of your credits By and large For the last 15 years Are producer Line producer Executive producer Something like that But you were An assistant on four movies A Gerard Butler vehicle

[00:07:13] A Liam Neeson vehicle A Brad Pitt vehicle And a Mark Wahlberg Russell Crowe Catherine Zeta-Jones vehicle What in the world? Like that is I mean like And you were Your assistant Spencer Silna What is it? What is that? What's going on there? So again This is going to be The technical podcast So hopefully The fans don't tune out on you And lose everybody But basically You know 2000 Everybody knows In like the Mid to late 2005

[00:07:43] 2010 It was a massive Financial crisis So as a result The film industry Was having a lot of problems And we used to have Those Is it called Indie tent poles Those 30 to 50 million Dollar action movies Where you've got Liam Neeson fighting wolves Gerard Butler You know Saving the day So those movies Could basically be Financed with international And then a domestic audience Because the movie theaters Were still big I was working at a Film finance company Spencer Silna Was one of the partners That's where You know

[00:08:13] And basically They were A bunch of young guys With really good taste These are like Before A24 Before Neon Like these were the guys At the time And they were picking And choosing The right kind of Thinking man's action movies To put money into And to stand behind And we got to go Make some great movies Killing them softly Is so underrated Yeah Agreed Like just crazy Crazy Ray Liotta Andrew Dominick's A good director You've never seen anybody Get their ass kicked Like Ray Liotta

[00:08:43] And killing himself No kidding If you like action movies Or thinking man's action movies That's a good one I dig the gray too I think a lot of people Thought it was going to be Like taken And that was the disappointment But like The philosophical wanderings Of Liam Neeson You know He doesn't attack wolves To the very end And you don't really Even really see that I actually really dug that movie A way that a lot of people didn't But you're right All four I've not seen Broken City But all four And Machine Gun Preacher I remember But I

[00:09:13] Yeah That's pretty wild That those four Are kind of in the same vein Yeah It was a heyday Of filmmaking at the time Because you could give You know Joe Carnahan Is a tremendous Right You know Needless to say Andrew Dominick Great guys And it's just like They were in a position Where they could say I don't need to make A $150 million studio movie I can make a $30 to $40 million Action movie And still have really good quality That's what those were That doesn't really exist

[00:09:42] The $50 million drama picture Doesn't really exist anymore Right No Because basically I won't say who But like streamers Will just give a ton of money To Instead of doing it For $30 to $40 million They'll just give $150 million To those same caliber Of directors For it to be a streaming movie And then Basically You know It's a little bit lopsided But I think there'll be A return of indie cinema For sure Now that kind of technology Has caught up with Creativity And there's ways

[00:10:11] To figure that out If that makes sense Yeah For you Was your desire Always to be On the movie Making side of things Behind the camera Creating Or did you have A desire to Be an actor And then said Actually I really like The creative side of it Or how did all that Shake out for you It was always I mean I grew up Working in construction And building houses And so Understanding how to build something Was always kind of like In my mind And then when I realized

[00:10:41] What films were exactly It made it Really easy to understand Okay This is what I need to do To create this And be in this world So I started line producing So I could understand the money Because everybody wants to be A director Or an actor And it's just like But then all those people Need to know Who's going to help me Make the movie And so when you can Figure out a way To understand And actually make it And bring the financing And bring the distribution Then you're an asset And everybody has to be an asset Or you know Life is too short You talked about the money We hear this thing

[00:11:11] Where Hallmark movies Are 15 days and 2 million dollars Like we hear that Like And I do know Because of some friends On certain movies That that is not the case And Hallmark puts a little bit more Behind their big You know It used to be Hallmark Hall of Fame But then they'll still have Like a tentpole movie or two Is by and large With the noted exception Is that still the case? 15 days, 2 million? The 15 days is The money wise It's ballpark It all kind of depends

[00:11:40] But this is an interesting thing That You can look at Big tentpole movies Which are You know Four times the budget Somebody just snuck by In the background It was wonderful My niece is running Running behind It was fantastic She crept by And thought she was Under the camera And wasn't She could have gone out The front door But she didn't Yeah It's fine The one Easter egg I'll say is Is that almost every name In all the movies Will have One of my nieces Or sisters Or somebody That's cool That was Alana

[00:12:09] From Love and the Sun 2019 2019 Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana Shout out Alana And it's her birthday Too Happy birthday Alana There you go So I can say that When it comes to Those big tentpoles And then when it comes To like acquisitions Where sometimes People just decide Hey I can go out And make a great Hallmark movie And then sell it To Hallmark later I've done And I've done I guess enough of them That you wouldn't be able To figure out which ones I've done movies That I'm just like

[00:12:39] Wow this is going to Just destroy everything It's going to crack It's going to make Make waves And then I've just done Another movie that I'm like That was a good experience That was fun And a movie that I Never would have thought Went viral Blew up Exploded I'm just like How did that happen And so what I would say Is that I don't think the money Matters at all I think the storytelling And I think that the characters Mean everything We did a movie called Crashing Through the Snow Great movie Great movie Top 10 for me Great movie

[00:13:07] Like character driven Right And So many characters So many things going on And it was like A concern of like Are we going to be able To track all of this And the fact that we Did not cut one scene Out of that movie And there were so many Scenes in that movie It was just because Like you related To the characters right away And almost the whole Thing took place In that house Like We shot I think 11 days in the house And then the other four Were just random Locations quickly I mean great Established locations But it was Character driven So I don't know if that

[00:13:37] Answers your question About money But that's my thought I like it Tell me about The learning curve You said that you Kind of got brought Into Hallmark Around 2019 For the first time And that you had History doing features Was there a learning Curve for you Like oh this is a Different type of Movie making This is very fast This is cheap Or did you find It pretty easy To adapt I loved it Because it's like I understand What the box is Right It's just like

[00:14:06] The first job I had was working For a director And his whole thing Was we were making Horror movies at the time And the parameters This was in 2007 It was A million dollar budget One location No more than Ten speaking roles Because that was When Saw And all those kind Of movies were coming Out that were Really you know Story driven And had to be In a box So when it comes To Hallmark movies It's great It's just like Okay here we have The main characters And those two need To be on the screen

[00:14:36] 80% of the time And they need to be Talking about each other 80% of the time And you know It's like a Procedural CSI So once you understand That's what you're making It's very easy To color in those lines It's very difficult To redo it 800 times But at least You understand This is what the audience Is looking for And then you can Go after it Yeah Do you know Right now Off the top of your head Currently Released how many Hallmark movies You've been the Executive producer on No I'm just like

[00:15:06] It's over 20 Yeah I counted 20 On IMDb So that I don't know How right that is But that's what I counted In that time You did one Netflix executive Producer wedding Wedding season Yep What's the difference Like are there Stark differences In what that looks Like as your job And budget And filming And locations Or is it pretty Much the same Because I always Contend those Netflix movies One to one Tend to look A little bit better Than Hallmark They have Well they definitely Have a lot more Time and money Okay

[00:15:36] My theory of producing Is you're on this Side of the river You gotta get to That side of the river And you've got a boat And you need people In that boat with you And people have to be Rowing And if you're not Rowing you need to Get off of the boat That's it The movie has to get made And so I started With my partner at the time On this side of the river And Netflix was very excited We were gonna make the movie And then all of a sudden COVID happened And a lot of other things And then they decided They wanted to elevate it Bigger than what We initially had planned And then they said They were gonna bring in Imagine Entertainment With

[00:16:05] Ron Howard's company Brian Grazer And I was like I'm just happy to sit In this little corner Of the boat Like as long as I'm not getting Kicked off of it So I definitely I get to play a role In the development And finding it And we sold it to Netflix But COVID was going on I was shooting A Hallmark movie When we were starting Prep on wedding season And then they shut down For like three weeks And then I just finished The Hallmark movie And then they started shooting And then they shut down again So I basically never even

[00:16:35] Got to go to set But I just got to be involved On the side So that was not Me in that driver's seat It was this other Wonderful producer Swati Who You know Again She was Indian as well As any wedding movies So she She kind of took over That boat For that time That's awesome You mentioned that There's You know Your passion projects And you have the ones Where you just fly out And you do your thing What was the first Passion project one For you The first one The light bulb went off Like this is gonna really

[00:17:05] This is it Um For Well the first movie I did Was just exciting Because you know It was You know It was called Anything for Love It was like Ten years ago Um Paul Green Eric Christensen Um Wild Wild It was my first experience And I was You know At the time Still You know Growing In the industry And Randy Pope You know Called me And he's like And I know that I was partners with Steve At the time But I was like Driving home from dinner

[00:17:35] And I get a call from Randy And it's like Why is Randy calling me I'm like a nobody At this point For sure And he's like Hey I just wanna let you know Like we're greenlighting that movie And I was just like Oh I just got a movie That was just like I still remember the phone call I remember exactly where I was And then to be able to Be there And like actually have notes That I implemented In something In a much bigger way Um And sitting on set It's just like Oh This is a good feeling Um That was the first Feeling like that But then I mean Love it or hate it Like uh Groomsman Being Being

[00:18:05] Being on set And like That starting Um With all the trials And tribulations For that That was most definitely The uh The most magical A lot Let's talk about Groomsman Because you've got Ron Oliver Who is a legend In the TV movie making world He's been on our show A number of times You've got Tyler Hines BJ Britt Jonathan Bennett Heather Hemans I mean the cast Everything involved They're what you're doing Telling a story Over three different movies Where you start At the beginning And you don't know Whose wedding it is This is a big Big swing by Hallmark

[00:18:35] And And uh Just after the sister swap Which was not the exact same But a big swing It's coming out on Hallmark Movie plus first Uh you know The biggest name right now In Hallmark Is Tyler Hines You've got him in the lead Um Walk me through Like Kind of Understanding that You didn't shoot 45 days From what I understand You shot Some A lot of that stuff Kind of together If I'm not mistaken Maybe I'm wrong But also As a question for me Who wasn't as big A fan of those movies Like

[00:19:04] Walk me through Anytime we decide To go hard On establishing An origin city Like Philadelphia Like Hallmark Does this all the time Where it's like We're from New York Or Boston Or Philadelphia And then they Proceed to Not You know To not do it Like walk me through That and then Just all of it I'd love to hear About the whole process Because it is still A marvel that it It was made The way it was made It wasn't a trilogy It was a triage I'll say that Because basically

[00:19:34] The Um It started with We're at Christmas Con Jonathan was like I just worked with Jonathan on something He's like I want to do The Groomsman This is the premise Of the movie Let's go tell Tyler And get him on board Right now We chased Tyler Into the bathroom Literally chased Tyler Into the bathroom And he's like What are you guys Talking about And like You know It moved very quickly And we had A plan Let me just say We had a big plan We had a very Everything mapped out We had a very Kind of Um You know Serial killer Diagram

[00:20:04] Of what these movies And then the strike Happened Oh boy Basically we were just You know We had this first writer Greg who was fantastic Who helped Kind of shape the whole thing And then the strike Happened And then the strike Ended And then we needed To make the movies Because we had Jonathan's schedule Tyler's schedule Ron's schedule So we had to figure it out But we basically Had to Be in Bulgaria And then we weren't Able to leave Because of a bunch Of other reasons For a certain amount Of time And then the guy's Schedule shrunk

[00:20:34] Trunk So in a nutshell Ron bless his soul Um And then Also Rick Garman Who did Cherry Lane I mean He's been on the show Yeah He was He was initially On as the next writer And then he was trying Then his sketch So he couldn't So it's just like Luckily we were driving Around Bulgaria Scouting locations Ron in the front seat With his With his MacBook Literally Rewriting the movies As we went Because we had No choice We had to shoot That's peak Ron Oliver Right there

[00:21:03] Block shooting Is when you shoot Everything all at once So obviously Every time They were in that bar For all three movies We shot in the bar For like six days Right Yeah Um We didn't have We were going into prep Basically on We were starting to shoot On a Monday On Thursday We were all flying From one area Of Bulgaria To the next And Ron was basically Writing the third movie On the plane And just knew Like day four We need to shoot A scene of the third movie

[00:21:32] We had the scene We didn't have The whole movie And it was not And then it's just A collaboration Of trying to get All the writers Back on the phone To figure out this And make sure The network was happy They were 12 hours Behind us So it's like Just this alchemy Of insanity To try and make it all Way more respect For that Was Ron Was Ron typing With one hand And then Martini In the other hand With the other hand Or you know Guys Ron doesn't hold His own martini

[00:22:01] That's the correct answer I was gonna I wanted to keep Talking about The groomsmen But like Being an executive producer With Ron Is different Than being an executive producer With like a new Or young Like Ron is there He's set in the mood With music He's wearing a suit And tie Like he is that world's You know Kind of auteur Right Like that's who he is What are some Of the differences Is it less work Seems like a Like less work

[00:22:31] Or you're You're less hands on With Ron Or is it just Different work It's No it's It's definitely Less work Because it's trust Right It's just like Right from the very Beginning It's Which by the way I was shooting A different movie When I first Hallmark movie Got greenlit That Ron was directing So we were literally Wrapping Ron's movie And then starting The first Hallmark movie And so I had I'm on set every day And Ron's like Darling This this this So he was kind of Coaching me on Hallmark

[00:23:00] Before I did the movie So to be able to work With him on On Groomsman It was just like I knew You know He's like a self Prescribing doctor Like he knows Exactly how much blood He can lose Before he passes out So when it comes to These movies Like he just knows Oh I can do this I can do this And it's just like He I don't have to worry Like he knows That he doesn't have to You know Ask me Or like Because I I trust him And so like It's it's always the times That I have to leave For an hour On set To take a phone call

[00:23:29] That I come back And some crazy thing Has happened Yep It's just like When you know That you have a team there That can cover it You don't have to worry And that's obviously What Ron is I mean he's He's like a hundred Of these movies So Catch all Absolutely The legend Ron Oliver But you have to have That faith though You can't Yeah You can't question You know It's like I'm never Questioning Ron Because of the decisions He's making I'm questioning Hey why are we doing this So I know how to Jump eight steps ahead To make sure That you have that thing That you're gonna need For the other thing

[00:23:59] Cause he's just in Triage mode Making it work Yeah But the way that The Because of circumstances Grimson had to Had to happen Looking at it now Like how much Changed Like from vision Of what we really Wanted to do With the three And then the The three that we Finally saw When it aired So we started Shooting in May I think In March There was no Bride in the beginning There was no Story

[00:24:28] There was nothing It was basically Holy cow What we started With was it was The hangover For Hallmark Three movies About three guys Their bachelor parties And what brings Them together And kind of Those weekends And then it Turned into We needed to Add more romance And tweak some Things and then Literally just like So much It kind of changed In the zeitgeist That like We had to find A through line And you know Lily who plays The older daughter And the bride You know that was We just you know Ripped off friends It's the bride Running into the thing

[00:24:58] And who is she And that just Turned into a Big conversation That Rick at the time Rick Garman was Just like hey What if we do this And it's like oh That helps And then trying to Pull all those things in But again like schedule We had to shoot All those weddings In that one venue In three days That's crazy So That's crazy Yeah Man And it's just like Where are we Which wedding are we in And what are we doing In this position But again We had the A team So You did have the A team

[00:25:27] And that made a huge difference Originally it was a lot more Just about these three bros Three bros Hanging out Hanging out Which I think That's something that I keep wanting And I was hopeful That we would have gotten With those movies But not quite Like I don't necessarily Need a romance In every one of these And just let And there's a movie I think coming out soon That Or this holiday season And I'm like That could be something Where it's just Just about the friendship But I'm not surprised To hear

[00:25:57] You gotta have That's one note From Hallmark I mean I'm sure You don't even ask Right You've gotta have a romance Gotta have a romance But you know The recalibration Of everything I feel like right now Is what's happening And there's I feel like And I will get All the shame For saying it But I do feel like We're in like The next golden age Of Hallmark And I say that Because in the beginning Where it all started And I don't know If you guys have Thought of this Or heard it But it's like The first actual Hallmark movie

[00:26:27] Was flipped It wasn't The girl going home And you know It was the guy Going home Or it was the guy Going to the place I don't know if you guys Remember Doc Hollywood Yep Doc Hollywood Was Michael J. Fox Michael J. Fox Yeah Driving cross country He breaks down In the middle of nowhere And then he meets The girl And then they fall in love And then he decides He's not gonna go to Hollywood He's gonna stay In a small town And live happily ever after That's kind of like The catch all Where it started Right And then from there We went to Sex in the city

[00:26:56] Where you know In those 90s You know New York In the 70s and 80s Wasn't Manhattan Like we're thinking today Sex in the city happened And then this huge Influx of you know Gen X millennials Basically women In the mid to late 90s Started to move To the big cities So 10 years ago These movies were Very relatable Because that generation Was moving back home From college Moving back to the big city And saying oh Look at this Like you know And there was no Facebook And you know A reunion A high school reunion

[00:27:26] Meant something back then Because you didn't see The people for a long time So those movies have played And those movies Have done really well And it's addressed the romance But now I feel like We're moving into The next generation of Okay maybe someone's A single mother Or a single father And this is a relatable story That we can figure out How to tell And not only are they Looking for romance But they're looking for Happiness and closure With it It's their friends That they're reconnecting with Or just that they lean on To get through the times That we're in I mean my Mount Rushmore Of Hallmark movies All came out since 2021

[00:27:56] So I can't really argue With you from a standpoint Of what the quality Looks like Did you I want to hear What you talk about The city Like the Philadelphia Or New York Or Boston Like when When you're executive Producing a movie And you know that There's a city That's pretty notorious That this person's from What is it about Hallmark movies That they typically Don't really nail Stick that landing And if we know They're not going to Stick the landing Why not make them From not there Yeah By the way

[00:28:25] Send the bullets my way And call me out on it Because I didn't answer A question about Philadelphia Boston and things So that's great I can use Groomsman as an example Because we said We said Philly From the beginning And then obviously It went way off of Philly And a big part of that Was starting with time And then But attention to detail Like you're asking about We thought Oh it's going to be An Irish pub That'll be easy to find You know how many Irish pubs are in Bulgaria Because you know You think a traditional bar It's easy to find

[00:28:55] The only thing that we had That really said anything Philly Was Jonathan's Philly And we were like Oh great The Phillies are going to Let us use their brand And their logos And Jonathan could be A baseball player For the Phillies You know it's just like You have illusions of grandeur And then The train starts running And then Things can change And as much as It's fun to say Boston I mean I'm from New England And so You know Even if the Lead actors Can hit the accent

[00:29:25] The background's not going to There's no way They're going Especially if they're from Bulgaria So it's just like You know That's where it gets tricky So To answer your question Why don't they just make it Some random place It gets Sometimes it gets lost People do pay attention And try to But usually It Like In any one of my movies And there's a taxi In New York You'll see the emblem You'll see the badge Which is like a big deal Yeah But that's about as authentic As it gets Nobody sounds like They're from New York It looks like they're from New York

[00:29:54] But it's At least we get the badge On the taxi Well I think It's almost worse When one person tries You know what I mean Like if one person tries And the rest of the cast Isn't That almost takes you out of it It's like you know When there's royal movies They just make up A London They don't They don't call it England They call it Cordenia Or Wingravia Or something And it immediately allows people To have a varying Whack-a-mole British accent And you can just be like Well it's Wingravia Do you know what I mean Whereas As soon as you say Like I'm from South Carolina

[00:30:24] If you tell me The movies in South Carolina My BS meter Is at full go Like I'm immediately Looking at this movie Going Well why'd you say that Why did you tell me that And for You could have just Helped yourself Like help me help you You know what I mean Oh I get it I'm writing it down I'm making it I'm checking the time I want to touch on Ghost of Christmas Always Oh The best man Classic Come on

[00:30:53] And this is 2022 This is post Abbott This is new Hallmark And this is different Than anything Carl Winslow Carl Winslow This is different than anything We had seen on the network And we were excited about Just the fact that it was different But it also happened to be Fantastic An opening scene That left Bran and I Speechless A movie that doesn't start With a drone shot And an establishment of a city But a woman waking up To Ghost

[00:31:21] And them freezing the frame Bran and I From that point forward It's like we're watching The next thriller Like it was just Unbelievable So tell me about that movie And if your first time Watching or looking at the script And talking through the movie Did you have that same reaction Like oh this is different Yeah I read the script I remember reading the script And then getting to the end And I was just like Right But Kate sent me the script

[00:31:52] So that was the first thing Obviously it was incredibly well written And then I think at the time I was shooting with the director Rich Newey something else Maybe crashing through the snow I don't remember the timeline anymore But then basically He read it And it was just like You know The light bulbs went off And really quickly We're like Oh this This is something Yeah It definitely It definitely was But you know It needed

[00:32:23] The original script And what was looked at And called for We weren't able to Pull off What was some of the things On the page But if you remember Like the ghost department Or the Christmas department Yeah It was the Harvard Harvard Capitol building Like the Capitol building Of Harvard Connecticut Because we're shooting Connecticut Wow So we're scouting locations And we see this big Massive marble You know Beautiful building And as luck would have it This is a crazy story But I was You know I'm from Providence

[00:32:53] I'm shooting Connecticut I'm home having dinner And at a restaurant Next to me Is a congressman From Connecticut And he's telling me Oh it's exciting Blah blah blah He's like Come visit me At the Capitol building So I visited him That week And he gave me a tour And I was like You think we can shoot here So we ended up Shooting in the Capitol So we just made A different look to it Kind of like The way that What are those Those Keanu Reeves movies John Wick John Wick They have that kind of Really cool Yeah

[00:33:21] Steampunk type vibe Like so we just said Oh let's just use This building To make the most out of it And give it that look And tone It's supposed to be Something totally different So I just Do you have another one Oh I was just gonna say I just wanted on the record That I watched Spirited on Apple TV And I said Ghost of Christmas Always did it better And I want that on the record I mean that is That's something to say I don't know I don't know If I stand by it anymore But at the time I was very You were down on Spirited I was really excited about Spirited I don't know if I could go that far But I do think Ghost of Christmas

[00:33:51] Always is as good A Hallmark Christmas movie As I've ever Literally round and round Is my favorite That's a Hanukkah movie So from a Christmas movie standpoint Ghost of Christmas Always is my favorite And that kind of stuff That attention to detail matters Which does lead me To another question Which is Your job Right The director's job Is to get the shot Editor's job Is to make it not look stupid I mean we've talked to Randy Thomas And how You know They've started doing A better job Of making these movies More cohesive It used to be just

[00:34:20] Huge gaps And it was just like Well we But your job Is to make sure That all of that Gets done And the plane lands You get from Like you said From one side of the river To the other With everyone rowing Like At what point In making these movies Do you understand How much You know You're gonna have to do Or you have to draw a line To go We just can't get this shot Or we can't What's on the page here We cannot do Because Like You have to have The ultimate clock In your head I love that

[00:34:50] Like I'm like that As a human being Like I kind of know The clock Of what I'm doing And when it needs to be done Like When are those decisions Really really hard Like when is that How do you kind of know When to be more hands on And when to kind of Let Ron cook Do you know what I mean I Well I mean That's a That's Those are two questions Because it's like In terms of like A regular day at work Versus like A Ron day at work Or Because Because Ron You could give him a coconut And he'll make a piano Right

[00:35:19] So it's like Those are Those are different animals But While I'm reading the script I'm in my head You know Especially now Because There is a formula To a certain degree Right So I'm in my head Thinking okay We're at her house We're at her workplace Blah blah blah So I'll get through the script And have a pretty good idea And then I'll schedule it myself And I'm sure you guys Have seen movie schedules before But Basically I just block it all out I print out the strips And I look at How many days we need to be In all these different places And what's very realistic And

[00:35:49] Once you realize Like as an example And we've all seen this scene Where she's all dressed up She gets out of work She shows up at the restaurant Shows up at like The Ruth Chris type restaurant Which isn't Ruth Chris And then she sits down And the guy's late And the waiter comes And they talk about the bread And then eventually He gets around to Breaking up with her And then She walks out on page three And she's sad And the puddle Gets her all wet That's a $15,000 to $20,000 scene That we don't need to shoot Because we're going To an expensive restaurant We're filling it with extras

[00:36:19] We're lighting it We're You know Having a waiter We're paying a waiter to speak That doesn't really need to Just for him to break up with her Like she could just be waiting outside And he shows up late And they break up in front of the restaurant And they don't have to win And to say Guys we don't need this scene This way We can pull it off With something a little bit different So that we can save that money For what really matters And more importantly We need to say These are two actors That may or may not Have ever worked together Ever before Or even know who they are

[00:36:48] And casting can be last minute Based on schedule So we say Let's not have the kiss scene At the end of day one In the cold And it's a summer movie So let's schedule this The right way And be realistic And when I know We're not going to make these days Then that's when I'll put my foot down And say It's a stretch But we're not going to make it So I'd rather Have someone rewrite it Or figure it out differently Than try to shoot something That's unshootable And then you just You know But then there's

[00:37:18] But there's the trust there And then you get on the phone With the network exec And say Hey This is going to be impossible Unless we move something else around And again What we're at now And I'm not just saying this Is we're at that new golden age Where that's afforded to us We can have those conversations And they say Alright great What is it about? Great Let's try to You know There's trust There's a lot of trust right now With a lot of the team members I think because we all came out Of this trauma bonding of COVID That like We know how to do these movies

[00:37:47] In 13 or 14 days If we need to With masks and everything So it's a little bit more Structured And how early in the process Are you doing that? It's like going through the script Thinking about how we can Tighten things up How close to production Are you getting involved in that? Because we hear from like Actors who are like I found out two days before And I am now in the movie Or we filmed in November And it released in December Or something crazy I have to imagine

[00:38:16] You're involved a bit earlier than that If it's a movie that we're developing Well if it's movies we're developing We were developing Groomsmen For 16 months Before we started shooting And we really only developed it For two and a half months Because we had to throw everything out For the most part And rewrite everything Or recreate everything In the last three months So I've had both As we're developing And as we're doing the first drafts I'm trying to implement Notes and changes and tweaks Through development process

[00:38:46] So that it is realistic Because if they start on a ski slope And they end in Miami Then we're going to have issues Or we have to be realistic About how we're going to shoot it So that we're not breaking people's hearts Thinking they're going to get something And then something else comes out of it Which of course there's always a give and take But at the same time You know I'll get a call on a Thursday or Friday And say can you go and prep on Monday The very first movie that I did It was Randy called us on a Friday And said we might have a slot Can you guys start right away

[00:39:15] And then it was Monday morning At like 11 in the morning And I was still shooting a different movie And we did a conference call And Randy said no no no We need the movie now Start right now And Terry Ingram Another movie that wasn't going to happen Was casting I never met Terry before So I go down to the casting room Terry's sitting there Reading the script He's literally on page like 103 He's like one second Finished Read the script Let's start casting I guess Nice to meet you I'm Terry

[00:39:44] And then we just started casting That movie So that was basically day One of 15 of prep Where it was like that morning So it was basically like 14 and a half days of prep So you get 15 days of prep Before 15 days of shooting Correct Sheesh And you do Since 2020 you do an average Of about three of these a year Is that about right for you? Is that about right for your sanity? Ballpark Yeah Yeah yeah yeah Okay But if like you had to do four or five

[00:40:13] You could do it At what point are you like I can't possibly My sanity I wouldn't be able to do it What number would that be for Hallmark? I guess four or five It's because you know They You need to I'm not going to ever I don't want to be shooting Ten things at once And just visit sets I can't do that It's just never going to be who I am And so I need you know I need to be there for prep I need to be there for shooting Once we're in post It's you know a lot more

[00:40:42] The director will take over and do their cut I'll try to sit along with them as it goes So I'm working alongside of them But for the most part I need to be there for those kind of 12-13 weeks To be paying Are you watching dailies? I'm not watching dailies Because like This is the director This is me I'm sitting behind the monitor every time So I never need to watch dailies Unless we're afraid something's going to get missed Or screwed up But um I'll watch the cuts obviously To make sure that If there was a

[00:41:12] If there was a shot we really liked And we forgot about We say Oh what about the time that you know She dropped the glass instead And it's like Oh that's right We forgot And go into that and find it Uh Den you brought up Round and round earlier I do want to talk about round and round We actually reconnected Thanks to a A reel About Vic Michaelis And how Vic Michaelis is the best And should be on the network again Uh Which I stand by And apparently a lot of people do as well Yeah But round and round is So good Amazing And it's so funny

[00:41:41] And I want to know From your side What makes that movie work? This is a A thing that we've seen So many times The Groundhog Day Trope What is it about This one in particular That stands out Not just as a Time loop movie But as a Hallmark movie Um Very very very well written And developed To begin with Um Which again is Um Which by the way There's

[00:42:10] A slew of amazing Exactly Hallmark It just That's That's Kate and Tamara Who Uh Worked together in the past And they had a They had a solid Understanding of What What to be developing In writing And not just a dream Idea of something Um And then Stacy came in And she had a Vision She had a very significant Vision And a plan And she grew up as By the way She came up as an AD Right So we have a Perfect They're thinking And you know I mean that movie was Treachery Because it was a time loop

[00:42:40] So we had to shoot everything Over and over and over again Right Um That was very difficult But you know Vic and Brian Coming to the table Um And like You know They They They were Two actors Who were Really really really Down To be making that movie Um And you know We shoot a lot in Vancouver And almost every other night We're you know Next door at the restaurant After we wrap Talking about things On the weekends We're getting together Um And that That kind of plays it When everyone's making

[00:43:10] The same movie And really locked in And there's a lot of attention To detail And because it was A Hanukkah movie And of course Ryan Murphy Is gonna go Make a Hanukkah movie Um You know A lot of attention To detail Goes into it Because we want to make sure Doing everything right Whether or not we do Or do everything right It's a question Um But we try really hard So people really Locked in on that movie Yeah Tamara also wrote Uh Crashing Through the Snow Didn't she? Yep Yeah I mean Those two both Do you When you're looking At your next project

[00:43:38] And it seems like Within the grand Like Hallmark Is such a grand Like universe now It's not the same Eight people Doing everything But it does seem like There are pockets Of people that all Tend to work together Um Is Is Like is How accurate is that? It just seems that way to me It's like These actors prefer These directors And these It just seems like There's a lot of Replicating of cast and crew When there's a new movie Coming out Well I think

[00:44:08] It's starting to Mix up a little bit now Again Post-COVID But you know There's There's a lot There's a lot of Trauma pawning in COVID Right That's why when you see Um These situations Where you know It's not a show I mean All of these You know The Avengers of Hallmark As I like to refer to them as Right It's just They're A everyone's like Half related In some degree Yeah Everybody knows everybody But with COVID It's just like We were all kind of A traveling circus In different places

[00:44:37] So we'd get to know everybody Like this This person worked With this director So they communicate And then they want to You know You want to work with The person who just Made this movie So That kind of Gelled that together So So that kind of Falls into that trap If that makes sense I think it's starting to Expand a little bit more now Because some new people Are coming in Um And you know At a certain point You just can't keep putting You know Andrew and Nikki And X, Y, and Z They've already On a wheel Or whatever else It might be So

[00:45:07] I don't know Did that answer the question? Yeah No I think it did And I I think you The way you said it Is exactly what I was thinking In my head I think there's some folks That just I mean if I was friends With somebody I would probably find a way To work with them too So there's that I You know To be fair Do you Do you finish one of these I'm not I'm never going to ask you To talk bad about a movie You've done That's not your job That's my job I I But Do you When you've Hit print on this Or give your final send off Or whatever it is you do That's the last thing

[00:45:37] Before you go Here's the movie Hallmark Do you have a pretty good radar On if this is going to be Great Or if it was Or if we finished it And the goal was The mountain was just We did it And we did produce the thing We said we were going to produce And you go This may not This isn't going to be A memorable one Or do you have that ability To kind of know that Pretty regularly I'd be lying I'd be lying Because There are times That I'm on day 13

[00:46:07] And I'm like Hmm And You shoot a couple scenes And it's just like Wow What just happened And It's a little It's a little fumbly for me Because We might be shooting scene On day 13 or 14 or 15 Which is like Minute 2 or 3 of the movie Which sets everything up And sets it off On a path That all of a sudden It's just like Wow Like this This kind of just Immediately made you connect With these characters In a certain way Or ties things in

[00:46:37] And actors Directors too But like Actors Never cease to surprise me They'll have something They'll be doing something A certain way And then you'd be like Why? And then all of a sudden Because they'll get to that scene That set that up And you see it And it's like Oh that's why And then like When the movie plays It's just like It flows Which I didn't see Because sometimes I'm not I don't say not paying attention to it But I'm not seeing it Because I'm focused on You know Make sure the catering truck Doesn't Yeah Whatever Yeah

[00:47:06] Do you have one of your movies That's been released That you don't think It's the love That it deserves? There's some Ryan Murphy joints That are like These are all timers Is there one that You're like I think that you Dan you should go And re-watch this one You want me to go re-watch it? Well boy Let's see I guess if you wanted to say Underrated When it comes to the New Kind of

[00:47:35] Movie making That I want to see more of What was it called? And I'd just say What was it called? Because it's always like The script comes with this title Yeah And then you change it up Yeah And then like I realize that when it's airing It's a completely different title Project Christmas Wish Yeah Oh yeah Yeah I love that movie Travis Van Winkle Travis I mean He obviously Amazing Amanda I've got to make Two or three movies

[00:48:05] With Amanda now Tomorrow's her birthday Now that I think of it Like That movie was Again Very sweet The guy was a widower You know He had a young daughter That She was amazing The daughter was amazing In that movie She stole everything And her and Travis Were doing Hamilton On the set All day long And it was the coldest movie I've ever been on That movie I think is fantastic And maybe a little bit underrated And that was like In the throes of COVID 2001 I think Yeah That's Avery Peters Who's won a decade

[00:48:34] And just sent videos to us Avery She's great So great Yeah That was the first Hallmark movie that she did And I got her Signed headshot At my house As you should And like We've raved about Avery Many times We have Her parents are always so sweet And they're like Thank you so much They are great Yeah That movie also Has Amy Groening In it Who's now A Hallmark lead And Jeff Beasley directing So like a sneaky All-star cast In that movie That is

[00:49:02] Like not what you would You know Not what we think of now As Hallmark Avengers But I mean Travis Has been in Some Like just Next level Amanda Schull's Amazing So yeah You were working with With talent Maybe that we normally Don't get to see On Hallmark Yeah And Amanda had a Four month old I think at the time In COVID So she drove With her husband And son At the time It was It was bananas I mean you made

[00:49:32] You helped make Cranberry Christmas Project Christmas Which Crashing Through the Snow I would say Delivered by Christmas Is that what that's called The movie With Is it delivered by Christmas Those four are The COVID movies In my Those are the movies That were the best Pre-Christmas 21 So Project Christmas Wish and Cranberry Were 20 And then Crashing was Summer of 21 Release date Those three movies You know Along with Delivered by Christmas

[00:50:01] Kind of represent In my opinion The best of like COVID Christmas movies And then Unexpected Christmas I think is Is a top four For me All time With Tyler And with Joy Lenz That comes out In Christmas Of 21 But I mean To put those Three together It's a pretty good Trail During COVID Is next level Man Yeah Cranberry was wild Because that was Nikki's Son was like Just out of surgery Her whole family Up to Vancouver

[00:50:31] You know She was like Staying away From her family So she could Shoot the movie Like she was Just a True warrior And that was Nikki and Ben Yeah By the way Ben I mean How do we not Talk about Ben Talking about The guy I mean Yeah What a dude That guy On the porch When he starts Crying there At the end Of that movie Really impressive I can't help But notice You said You know Three Four Five Every year Is what you Can do According to IMDB

[00:51:01] Zero For 26 So far Which I imagine Means a busy Q4 For For you For Ryan M. Murphy I was told That I could say That there is Something coming For Christmas Great There's the Nights Before Christmas coming Oh That's you Which is Tyler Yeah That's a fun One It seems I haven't seen It but it Sounds like A fun one I think that That is a

[00:51:32] Again I don't care I'll shoot myself In the foot That is a situation I think that you guys Really like the movie But it's The Again The new golden The new golden age Of Hallmark There's There's a lot Of trust Right From Up above That trickles down That says Hey you know what We trust you guys I got Camden who's The The Exec on that movie She trusts us Russell Is the writer Tyler Lacey Lucy Guest The director Like just Of course I'm going to say

[00:52:02] All the names But it's just like They let us go make that movie Camden trusts us And I tell you what I think you guys are going to Like that movie Because it's A lot of things That's another Time loop movie Correct What What did you learn Doing Round and round That you did differently With this one To kind of help Help things along So block shooting Is when you have to Shoot everything All at once Right Which is not easy And We When we started Round and round

[00:52:32] You know It was big Massive family scenes So although it seems easy Because you're in one house You've got a massive Jewish family So you've got 15 aunts And uncles And friends And everybody Stuck in the living room So to try to shoot All those scenes The way that it was Originally scripted It was seven days In the house With 15 actors There every day And if you just want To try to do the math And how it's Extremely expensive So what Stacy did Because again She's an AD With her brain

[00:53:00] Is you know Brian and Vic Would have to have A conversation So that She would You know She'd pull Brian To the side And they'd have The conversation In the courtroom By the way Rick Hoffman I mean Oh my gosh This guy Above and beyond The I mean Talking about a dream Like bucket list Of actors To work with Put them in every movie Yeah So again That plays into it When you got Vic Brian Rick Like all these actors There to like Play and make it work

[00:53:30] It sings So anyway That was a big part of it It was like Okay how do we Block shoot this In a way that We can feel like We're all there But everybody knows When you're at a big Family event Everybody's not just Sitting on top Of each other In the kitchen They're all Kind of sprawling Out to different places So we block shot That in a specific way So we can make it work So with Eves We did a lot Of the same thing We basically Just knew how To Nights before Christmas I'm sorry The title changed Yeah of course We just knew how To schedule it In a way That we could pull it off And literally We just Tyler Hines Has never worked so hard I think In his life Have you

[00:54:00] This is your first time Working with Tyler Yeah Oh no Oh no Groomsman I forgot Yeah They did a whole year Together Yeah Yeah I'm trying to think Of Is there something else Or is that it I think that's it Yeah Well it's good That someone's Finally making him Work hard So that's Yeah Yeah That guy Doesn't make enough movies Unbelievable Is it Since I've got you here And you've worked With him four times The vibe we've Always gotten from Tyler Since he was An up and comer Who literally

[00:54:29] Would come on this show Four or five times To now Where he literally Has to Make sure That his time Is allocated Accordingly Just to get Everything done In a day And make Everyone happy He seems Like a guy That gets Almost more Excited about Making your Project Your dream Come true Not by his presence Like he loves Joining Like with Lacey Chabert Who did this movie About

[00:54:59] The Carolina movie Right That was very Close to her heart She'd been wanting To make it And Bill Abbott Didn't let her Make it And she makes This movie And he's like Yeah I'll be there Or in the groomsman Him like really Fighting for Jonathan's movie To be the centerpiece Of this thing Or Aaron Crayco Making this Christmas above the clouds Where he literally Is only in that movie For about 30 minutes And he could be starring In as many of these As he wants It seems to really And I'm not trying To speak any better About him Than anyone else has It just seems like

[00:55:28] His favorite thing To do Is to come alongside Someone else's vision And to make it happen Is that accurate Is that an accurate Depiction of this guy It's exactly that I mean that was the That was the You know not to say He doesn't of course Have an opinion And have ideas But like You know again With groomsman We chase him in the bathroom And he was like He saw Jonathan's vision And saw what Jonathan Was talking about And you know Jonathan's that guy Right I mean Jonathan's the

[00:55:58] I you know Looking to him For innovation Is kind of Jonathan's always At like the forefront Of everything He's kind of like That tastemaker So Tyler could Understand what his Idea was Obviously right away We both could But like His whole thing Is how is he Going to come in And service The movie To make that work Right And service that vision And you know It's funny Because he I mean he says it himself He's like He doesn't I don't know if he sees himself

[00:56:27] As much as like an actor But like a craftsman And like Somebody to help Make that work Make those things work And build those Seems like a match Made in heaven With Ron Oliver Who just is like Where's the way You know Juggling chainsaws Trying to get the script Written Wow And you know The one thing That we Articulate on a couple Things we really wanted Was those relationships Again the relatable Relationships

[00:56:57] That if You know There are The audience members Who are the diehards This is the podcast Talk about There's the audience The diehards And then there's The friends And the boyfriends And the sons And the grandsons And the nephews That you know Watch the movies With their loved ones Because they are asked to So it's like How do we Bring some of that Relatability of a single Father And a relationship Where a guy's Talking to his New love interest His father And that scene with him Which got cut short A little bit But it was amazing With him and Cosimo

[00:57:27] In Italy Where they're talking About going to get The daughter outside Of the car And he kind of Slaps him on the cheek A little bit Like yeah That was a Great time But what I hear you Saying is that If you have a vision Involving Tyler Hines You should chase him Into the bathroom And tell him about it The way I understood it Every Okay got it I'm glad I do want to ask This question Really quickly Christmas con is going To be nuts this year Yeah I don't think he uses The public restrooms If you can play it I do want to ask This question This is a good question From Double Decker Katie

[00:57:56] Who used to work In production for movies Talking about how 15 day prep is crazy How do you get Locations in place That quickly That's a really quick Turn around to know Like we need these locations And then to actually Make those locations Happen and secure Those places I know every movie Is different But I have to imagine That might be one Of the tougher parts Is just figuring out Where the heck We're going to shoot This thing A solid AD To start with the schedule And know what the priorities are

[00:58:26] Priorities of work What we need When we're going to need it How long we need it for A solid production designer Who is definitely underrated People don't appreciate Production designers as much Like a lot of the other Cast and crew But you know This is great production designer Trevor on Vancouver Island I mean this guy He did all the Christmas House movies He's done tons of movies But like He just you know Says it best Just rip off the bandaid What do we need to do We got to build a big Ferris wheel on day one We'll get it done

[00:58:59] Again with schedule What are the priorities So if I know We need a big Christmas festival We're not going to schedule that On the first week Because it's too much And it's also How can we start off with Letting people kind of Fit into a space And get to know each other And start with an easier day So if we can start with like Herb house Or his house Or you know Maybe their work environment So you can get A rhythm going Instead of just like Big family dinner Day one of shooting It's just like That's going to be a train wreck It's too much stuff Going on at once

[00:59:28] This would be my last question Until rapid fire Obviously Of course But how do you do Watching movies Like do you Are you able to Like especially movies At the higher end Of like you know 200 million dollar budget Or like big time movies Are you able to watch those Without your brain Wandering into I wonder how they Got this together Or man it must have Taken a lot to do Like are you able to Shut that part of your brain off Or does that Heavily inform Even you going to the theater With a bucket of popcorn

[00:59:58] First time I see a movie It's easy to watch Second time It's a mess Like my favorite scene Especially older movies You guys remember Footloose Yeah So in Footloose Because I've never seen This ever again It doesn't make any sense Production wise They're washing the bug In one of those Drive-in car washes Yeah And I'm like They lost a location Yeah They had a location They lost it They're like We can go shoot that car wash Because they're washing the car In the rain And it's just like Washing a car The noise The sound

[01:00:28] Everything about Shooting that There's You can't get the camera It's like Is a nightmare So it's like That's So when I re-watch movies again I'm like Oh that's That's the harder thing Re-watching movies When I was younger Things like that That's fascinating I love that Yeah All right Let's rapid fire It's where we each Get to ask you Three questions About anything And you gotta answer them Quickly if you want to Dan Best food in New England For you Like whether it's Providence or Connecticut Or Boston or wherever The Crow's Nest in Warwick Was my grandparents' restaurant

[01:00:58] From 50 years ago So that's You'll say that That's a good That's a good answer When I watch movies And I stick around For the credits I see A best boy What's a best boy And do you think I'm a best boy Do I have best boy Potential I'll go best guy Okay Best guy So best boy So there's the gaffer Who's the guy Who You know There's the gaffer And then there's the

[01:01:29] If the gaffer's in charge Of all the lighting The best boy Is the guy under him Got it Best boy Willing to let The stuff fall on him Because he's the best boy He's the best boy Yes Okay Your most memorable Walking out of the theater movie Like you saw in the movie theater And you just were like Wow That was a game changer Final Destination 1 And then I walked back in And watched it again Wow That was a good one You and I have to be like About the same age

[01:02:01] Yeah What were you gonna say? No that's it I just remember my friend And I walk in I'm like What just happened And walk back in And watch it again I want you to keep Producing homework movies As long as you want to But do you have Another genre of movies That you That you are interested In potentially Dipping your toe in? I love biopics I love You know Forrest Gump Is just a lot of homework Masked in You know Sugar Right We kind of learn a lot about

[01:02:30] America and the world Through Forrest Gump But we don't realize it So stuff like that Is great And then Just kind of Old school fun Movies that You know Don't really get made So much anymore But are gonna come back Star power is gonna Realize it I like it Yeah Crashing through the snow Ghosts of Christmas always Round and round You can only recommend One to someone Who's never seen A Hallmark movie before Which one are you recommending?

[01:02:59] Ghosts of Christmas always Crashing I guess I'm gonna say Ghosts of Christmas always Only because The other movies Are stacked with cast Which people will find Brian Greenberg And A name that isn't said enough Kim Matula Kim Matula Kim Matula She's unbelievable I mean Come on Yeah It's a good answer I would say

[01:03:28] Round and Round is my favorite But that's my answer Because I think it's the most accessible For someone that's not Watched those movies Before And don't have They don't have an expectation I think Ghosts of Christmas Always qualitatively Is kind of the The bar setter there And I mean That movie was Really really hard to make And that was just Because it was very It was stone cold It was the coldest I've ever been I think even colder Than Winnipeg And it was just It was a very challenging Movie to make Because of COVID Because of all these Different things And it was You know

[01:03:58] Kim and Ian killed it But I mean Just Kim is A machine Yeah A machine Yeah My last one If you could be Any animal for a day What animal would it be And why Oh I'd be my dog What kind of dog Right now I have an Australian Shepherd Border Collie mix Nice Last dog Who was with me Who was on every single Movie site all over the world He was He was a Border Collie mix He had the best life

[01:04:27] He had his own passport He'd been to every Single set He had his own trip That's the best boy Right there That's the best boy Yeah Absolutely Ryan this was so much fun To get to talk And kind of see A different side Of the Hallmark movie process I think If anything It'll give people A whole new respect For these movies While they're watching them Which is a lot of fun Dan Do we want to come back tomorrow I would love that Let's come back tomorrow Until then Maybe the first to wish you was Merry Christmas

[01:04:57] Deck the Hallmark Is a Bramble Jam podcast Produced by Brandon Gray And yeah that Greenville, South Carolina For more information on the show Go to deckthehallmark.com Follow us on the socials At deckthehallmark Leave us a 5 star rating And review on Apple Podcasts To help others find the program And to help the show out financially You can go to Bramblejamplus.com And become a double decker Find the best corner of the internet Ad free podcasting Live video watch alums Movie chats And so much more That's Bramblejamplus.com

[01:05:25] You're about to hear some ads That help keep the lights on Here in the old studio Thanks for listening Or don't listen It's really up to you At this point It's at the end of the show I mean You're listening to me Hi But here they come I promise they're coming Yep Here they are Happy day Bye