It’s been nearly 10 years since James Denton and Teri Hatcher appeared together on the small screen. The actors, who played Mike and Susan Delfino on the ABC series Desperate Housewives, were recently reunited in the Hallmark movie A Kiss Before Christmas.
In an interview to promote the movie, Hatcher said it took the pair a long time to get back together because they were waiting for the right project
“I guess we needed Jamie to come up with a script,” Hatcher joked during an interview with film critic Jeffrey K. Howard.
Denton, who up until recently played Dr. Sam Radford on the Hallmark series Good Witch, not only stars in A Kiss Before Christmas, he is also one of its executive producers. The Nashville native mentioned the project back in August 2020 during an appearance on the Bubbly Sesh Podcast, a program devoted to all things Hallmark.
In the interview, Denton said he was working on a Christmas movie for the network he described as “a little bit like It’s A Wonderful Life, a little bit like Heaven Can Wait.”
About the movie
In A Kiss Before Christmas, Denton plays real estate executive Ethan, who becomes convinced that his nice-guy attitude has held him back career-wise when he finds out he has been passed over for a promotion at work.
He makes a wish for a different life, only to wake up the next morning and find out it has become reality. He is CEO of his own company, drives a Ferrari, and no longer has a wife and kids.
But Ethan soon realizes his old life was much more meaningful and becomes desperate to reverse the situation. He finds out that the only way he can do that is to convince his wife (played by Hatcher), that they belong together, and he only has until Christmas Day to do so.
Both stars said they related to the movie because of its theme.
“I think it’s a common curiosity what your life could have been or would have been if you just look back at the big career choices you have made,” Denton said.
“We’re at the age where you think back and reflect on what could have happened,” Hatcher said. “I know that the best thing you can do is be grateful for where you are and take what you’ve learned and move forward.”
Closure for Desperate Housewives fans
The actors said they hope the movie helps some Desperate Housewives fans get closure.
“We felt like fans of Desperate Housewives sort of got gypped out of the happy ending of Susan and Mike,” Hatcher said.
In the series, Denton’s character was killed by a loan shark, leaving Hatcher’s character a widow with a young son, MJ, to raise. Though Denton was fine with his character leaving the show, Hatcher made it clear at the time that she did not like the storyline.
“I think it was a bad idea,” she said in a March 2012 interview with Entertainment Weekly. “When I heard about the plan of his death, I pitched a story idea that in the finale he would be in an airport in Bolivia and MJ and I would run into his arms and discover the whole thing had been some undercover witness protection program.”
The writers didn’t go for it, and both Hatcher and fans mourned the loss of the Susan-Mike love story. A Kiss Before Christmas was the perfect chance to make up for that disappointment, Hatcher said.
“This was an opportunity to bring Mike back to life and let those fans vicariously live through the happy ending of the couple in this movie,” Hatcher said.
“And because it’s Hallmark, you know you will get to see them be happy,” Denton said. “It was just a perfect opportunity.”
A Kiss Before Christmas will air on Sunday, November 21 on Hallmark Channel at 8/7c.