This year, PEOPLE is celebratingthe network’s holiday movieswith a new special edition,It’s A Wonderful Lifetime Christmas. Inside, hear from stars of this year’s lineup, including Reba McEntire,Tia Mowry,Mario Lopez, andMelissa Joan Hart. Hart, with eight previous titles to her credit (including some as star and director), is the Christmas Queen. She’s played characters named Eve, Kate Holiday, and now in 2021’sMistletoe in Montana, a rancher named Merry. “We always want to keep everything very Christmas-related,” notes Hart, 45.
Her new film is based on the true story of Hart’s cousin, who fell for a wrangler in Wyoming. But since Hart, also a producer, was making a rom-com and not a documentary, she decided to swap the genders. “I said I want to be the wrangler!”
They shot in Montana over the summer, often suffering through over 90 degree heat while bundled up in flannel to reflect the film’s winter-holiday setting. Between takes, says Hart, “I was half-naked on set” trying to cool down. “My goal now is to get Lifetime to do a summertime Christmas movie near the beach!”
Melissa Joan Hart.Courtesy Lifetime
Courtesy Lifetime
A veteran of Lifetime holiday fare, Lopez, 48, headlinesHoliday in Sante Fe, filmed on location in New Mexico. Lopez, who in the past has played a toy store owner, this time portrays a purveyor of Christmas ornaments, while his real-life daughter, Gia, 11, plays his niece. “She steals the show,” says the proud father of three.
Mowry, who calls herself a “huge fanatic of Christmas movies,” appears in her third,Miracle in Motor City, for which she was also an executive producer. In the Detroit-set film, Mowry, 43, is a social worker who inadvertently promises to getSmokey Robinsonto perform at her church’s Christmas pageant. Not quite a spoiler alert: The legendary hitmaker actually shows up.
Tia Mowry and Smokey Robinson (with Markeda McKay) in “Miracle in Motor City.".Courtesy Lifetime
“We have Smokey Robinson!” says a delighted Mowry, who once attended the same church as Robinson. And when Smokey sings, can romance be far behind? As with so many Lifetime Christmas films, this one is really a valentine. “What I love about this movie,” says Mowry, “is we put a spotlight on the only thing you really need, which is love.”
PEOPLE’s new special editionIt’s a Wonderful Lifetime Christmasis available now wherever magazines are sold.
source: people.com
