Four new movies, as well as a host of old favorites, will air on Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies and Mysteries this weekend as Crown Media’s Countdown to Christmas heads into its third weekend.
Hallmark favorite Ali Sweeney stars in the first of the new films to air, Open by Christmas, which premieres Friday, November 12 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c. Sweeney plays a woman who finds a card from a high school secret admirer in an old textbook and becomes determined to track him down.
Brennan Elliott, Erica Durance, and Michael Karl Richards will also star in the romantic comedy.
“It’s all really simple and innocent,” Elliott said in an interview to promote the movie. “That’s what’s really refreshing about the story.”
“It’s a beautiful Christmas story,” Sweeney said. “It just has a lot of twists and turns and surprises along the way.”
Saturday double feature
On Saturday, November 13, My Christmas Family Tree will premiere on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c. Aimee Teagarden plays Vanessa, a young woman who takes a DNA test to track down her biological father. They meet and he invites her to spend Christmas with his family.
Everything is going great until Vanessa finds out there was a mix-up with her test results. The man she thought was her father is not related to her.
Later that evening, One December Night will premiere on Hallmark Movies and Mysteries at 10/9c. Peter Gallagher and Bruce Campbell play the former members of the world’s biggest folk-rock duo in the industry, Bedford and Sullivan. After one too many arguments on- and off-stage, the pair split up.
But when a TV network wants them to appear in a Christmas special, their children, played by Eloise Mumford and Brett Dalton, must convince their dads to put aside their differences and play the one song they vowed never to perform again, a hit called “One December Night.”
A Holiday in Harlem
Finally, A Holiday in Harlem will premiere on Sunday, November 14 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c. Starring Olivia Washington, Tina Lifford, and Will Adams, the movie is a romantic comedy that also touches on the love-hate relationship some people have with their families.
“I really, really love my family,” Washington’s character says in a preview of the movie. “It’s just complicated.”
Washington stars as Jazmin, a corporate executive who usually sends her grandmother a gift for Christmas instead of returning home. But when her grandmother insists she come home, Jazmin heads to Harlem, hoping to make a quick visit.
Her grandmother (played by Lifford) slips and falls in a Christmas-themed yoga class and Jazmin must take over planning her block’s annual Christmas Jamboree with her former best friend, Caleb (played by Adams). As the two work together, they talk about what went wrong between them and heal some old wounds.
Open by Christmas will premiere Friday, November 12 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c.
My Christmas Family Tree will premiere on Saturday, November 13 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c.
One December Night will premiere on Saturday, November 13 on Hallmark Movies and Mysteries at 10/9c.
A Holiday in Harlem will premiere on Sunday, November 14 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c.