The Holiday Junkie

Jennifer Love Hewitt's Unique Spin on a Christmas Movie with 'The Holiday Junkie'

With numerous acting credits in hits such as Ghost Whisperer and The Client List and a deep love of the holidays, one would assume that Jennifer Love Hewitt has multiple Christmas movies under her belt. But her upcoming Lifetime movie, The Holiday Junkie, which she also directed, is her very first.

The Holiday Junkie, which premieres on Sat., Dec. 14 at 8/7c and is available to stream the next day in the Lifetime app, follows Hewitt's character Andie who is facing her first Christmas after her mother, Mimi, passes away. Navigating her way through grief and a busy holiday season for her decorating company, Andie may also find love along the way with house manager, Mason, who is played by Hewitt's real-life husband Brian Hallisay. In addition to her directing credits on the movie, Hewitt leaned even more into the yuletide fun by co-writing, recording and releasing a new song, “Christmas Magic,” to accompany the film.

You dedicated The Holiday Junkie to your mother, Patricia, who died in 2012. How many holiday memories tied to your mom made it into the movie?

There are quite a few, including a snow scene, which is something my mom created for us when I was younger. There's a big glitter Santa that my mom gave me—it's in the movie more than a few times. My mom's favorite animal was a penguin, so we snuck in a lot of them.

A lot of the stuff my character, Andie, says about her mom in the movie is real. For example, when Mason puts up the Christmas lights for Andie, that's something my mom did for me when I was a teenager and had a broken heart. There are lots of little nods to her in the movie.

Did you have reservations about directing your husband in the movie?

It didn't dawn on me that he might want to be in the movie until one afternoon when someone at Lifetime said, 'Why isn't Brian playing Mason?' I was like, 'That's a great point!' We hadn't been talking about casting yet, but it was perfect because it's a movie honoring my mother, and Brian has done such a beautiful job for me in real life by keeping her memory alive with our children.

A lot of our real love story happened in the first few months of grief, like Andie and Mason and their story of grief. Then it dawned on me that he's been horrible to me in other things that we've been in together—9-1-1, The Client List—and I was like, 'Maybe we should have proof that Daddy could be nice to me on camera.'

Our kids [Autumn, 11; Atticus, 9; Aidan 3] will have this movie forever. Brian had never done a Christmas movie, and he doesn't get to play the romantic lead very often, which is weird because he's perfect for it.

As a self-confessed holiday junkie, what took you so long to do a Christmas movie?

That is the question, right? First of all…no one asked me, which is so rude. [laughs] How could you not ask me to do a Christmas movie? But I believe it was supposed to be this story, and it was supposed to be at this time, in the right place with the right people.

I watch no less than 30 Christmas movies a year—I start in November and go all the way through New Year's. Then I save the top four from everything that I've watched and watch those into February. I love them! I love knowing what's going to happen and seeing all the same familiar faces. I buy into all of it.

I had fun trying to make my version with this one and I guess it just wasn't supposed to happen until now. When we announced it, a lot of the reaction was like, 'Wait, she's never been in a Christmas movie? How is that possible?'

Was it hard to convince Lifetime to let you make a Christmas movie about grief?

I didn't pitch this movie to other places. I only took it to Lifetime, and I did that for a specific reason: I knew if anyone would allow it to be what I envisioned, they would. I knew from my experience on The Client List that they can push the envelope a little bit. When [screenwriter Anna White and I] got the story to a place where I felt proud of it, I took it to Lifetime and hoped they would get it and they did. They loved that it was complicated and that it was about grief at Christmas.

The truth is, for every happy person you meet during the Christmas holidays, you probably also meet five to 10 sad people. It's a hard time of year. I am a holiday junkie. I love Christmas, but I feel sadness every year at Christmas because I miss my mom, and I know my kids won't meet her. It's a complicated time of year. There are lots of movies that celebrate the other side of it, but I'm really proud we were able to make a Christmas movie that will make you laugh and feel good, but it's also in celebration of people who have pain.

What Christmas traditions do you, Brian and your kids enjoy?

I try to do a tree in every room of our house. Most of those are my responsibility because my husband thinks I'm bananas. When we do our main tree, the kids and I put on a movie while decorating but the lights are always Brian's job—he's very specific about it and loves to make sure that they're perfect. Honestly, he does the most amazing job. Once that's done, he takes a break to make his famous Christmas cocktail, which we only have during that time of year. The kids and I start doing the ornaments and he joins us. He and I always cheers when the tree is done, and we all stand back and look at it together. It is a family affair, but we all have our parts so it's a little less chaotic.

Brian always makes an amazing pasta dish on Christmas Eve. Every year we write Santa letters, make Christmas cookies and have a family Christmas Eve sleepover—everybody's in matching jammies and usually I'll make the kids a big bed with mattresses pushed together. It looks like something straight out of a Christmas movie. We have a tiny little Christmas tree that lights up, so it's just the glow of the light and the anticipation and all of us together. It's perfect.