Hallmark+ is adding to an already stacked holiday roster with its first series Holidazed.
Featuring a stacked cast including Ser’Darius Blain (Jumanji), John C. McGinley (Scrubs), Holland Roden (Teen Wolf), Noemi Gonzalez (East Los High), and many more, Holidazed answers the question of what the holidays are truly like behind closed doors.
Between running into high school bullies, old school family beliefs, and your Christmas lights blowing out as soon as you plug them in, viewers see a bit of themselves in at least one of the characters making for a fun holiday watch.
Ahead of the series premiere, The Knockturnal sat down with 12 principal cast members to discuss bringing the painfully realistic story to life and their unique holiday traditions.
Courtesy of Hallmark+
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Cast: Noemi Gonzalez, Holland Roden, Erin Cahill
The Knockturnal: Thank you so much for sitting down with us today. So let’s get into Holidazed. I love the series. I was telling other cast members, it’s Hallmark, so you think gushy, holiday feel. But you all gave a realistic portrayal of the holidays, like running into high school bullies and having your house lights blow out when plugging in the tree. All these different things that you don’t see on social media. So how much fun was it to bring this portrayal to life?
Noemi: Wonderful question. It was a blast because I really feel like in this world of social media, everyone wants to do the highlights reel. And I just want to feel seen. One of my favorite movies is The Grinch, and it’s because they need love too. The people that are going through it. Especially in the holiday season, you need that love. We all have inner battles, so you see it within each family. You see how it can transpire next door in this cul de sac. So it’s really cool to feel seen for once as opposed to it being so pristine. I naturally am like, “The holiday season’s coming up. What do I gotta get, what present, wrapping?” It just starts. I felt so cozy that I could go through this journey with this neighborhood.
Erin: It was such a joy to do the show because you do feel seen by it. We talked about this earlier and everybody’s going to feel seen by it. They’re gonna be like, “Oh, that’s totally me. Oh, that’s totally me too. Oh, that is my grandma.” It’s so relatable and real. It’s messy, and it’s also heartfelt and authentic, which is everything the holidays are.
Noemi: It’s still that pure joy of Hallmark really getting all of us together through those things. We can touch on those things and still have this wonderful warmth at the end of it. It.
Holland: I would just say it reminds me of a 90s holiday movie. Even though it’s a series. There’s this nostalgia aspect to it that reminds me of, like, a John Hughesian world. It’s just the Chevy Chase aspects to it. There’s just a really beautiful candid awkwardness that has, like that’s infused with joy naturally just watching that.
Noemi: Whatever can happen will happen.
The Knockturnal: It’s like when you’re a kid, there’s all the magic of the holidays and as an adult, you want to keep that magic but it is stressful. Holidazed dives into other peoples’ traditions. Do any of you have super specific holiday traditions that you thought were normal, then you ask someone and they say, “Nope, just you?”
Erin: That’s a good question. Ever since I was a kid, my sister and I would go downstairs. We would not wake our parents up. We would creep, and we would get our stockings, and then we would open them up together because my mom, “Santa,” would wrap each individual thing. I mean, even a toothpick would get wrapped. To this day, we do stockings first, but we thought that’s how you were supposed to do it. You know, you do your stockings and then you do Christmas.
Noemi: Tamales. As soon as tamales happen, it’s the holiday season. Not everyone has had a tamale. I’ve been on some sets where there’s this iconic tamale scene, and some of the crew has never had one before. For me, it’s such a staple. But when you have these worlds coming together. It’s really cool that now my partner is Jewish; now I have latkes.
Holland: Oh, that’s so cool. So do y’all have latke a tamale plate?
Noemi: Yes.
Holland: That’s so fun. Yeah. You should make a matzah tamale.
Noemi: And a movie though. To Holland’s point, a cinematic moment of holiday vibes being that we’re actors, I guess, maybe. Just that holiday time when all these specific genres and movies come out. Definitely the Grinch, Home Alone.
Holland: Oh, gosh. You know, this is a dose of a Southern white woman. My stepmom loves to go to Soul Cycle in the morning. So now we get to go to Soul Cycle.
Erin: On Christmas?
Holland: On Christmas. Soul Cycle that morning. Then champagne, and then we take the Christmas tree down right after the twenty-fifth. There’s some Hallmark movie that needs to be made about my stepmom Here’s the irony, she’s full of love. She gives the best gifts. She’s so thoughtful. She throws her all into it, but that’s also her. It is champagne, alcohol first thing in the morning with bubbles, and take down the tree immediately. Sometimes it’s right after we open presents. My stepmom is a lovely woman, so it’s ironic that those are the things that we do at Christmas. But it’s kind of funny. You’re like, oh, yeah. “Kim’s taking down the tree. It’s 12. You know, that tree’s out there by 1 PM.”
The Knockturnal: I love that story. Now this year I’m going to be thinking about the tree being taken down at noon. But, I want thank all 3 of you for sitting down with The Knockturnal. Holidays.
All three: Thank you.
Cast: John C. McGinley, Dennis Haybert, Ser’Darius Blain
The Knockturnal: Thank you all for sitting down with The Knockturnal today, how are all of you doing?
Dennis: Pretty good.
John: Couldn’t be happier.
Ser’Darius: Hey, man. I’m the big apple, baby. It’s good times.
The Knockturnal: I watched Holidazed, and it was such a fun comedy. Even though it’s Hallmark and you expect the sweet, mushy Christmas spirit, it was a fun and very realistic interpretation of what goes on during the holidays. How much fun was it to bring this painfully realistic, idea to life?
John: I had never worked for Hallmark before. I think Denny had. As a new experience for me, I felt surrounded by these astonishingly well-equipped crews and cast. You’re not reinventing the wheel and the Hallmark brand and the way they approach things is really efficient, unbelievably well done. I like working quick, 3 or 4 takes and moving on. I don’t necessarily think actors need 15 takes. That’s the landscape where we were working, where we were going. And I think that actors rely on their sensibilities instead of getting in their way when you do 3 or 4 takes.
People engage quicker. It’s it’s not necessarily sloppy if the cast and the crew, are on the same page. In my family and the part of our ensemble, everybody was in the same frequency and it was very ambitious. I think there are 27 principles, or maybe more, maybe 32, We were cranking. It never felt sloppy. It was right on, it was perfect. I loved working that way. I think what you saw, was really clever storytelling and a well-told tale.
Dennis: The beauty of it was and I think it was inadvertent. I don’t think it was planned. But we were in a location where we were a good distance away from our trailer. So, we all had to hang out on our set, which was our house. So whenever we went into another scene, we were already there. You can hear everything that is going on. So, you’re never quite out of it. Even if you want to doze off, you’re still mentally, physically, and emotionally in that house, and that energy is still there. It just permeates over everything.
Ser’Darius: I think operating, in reality, is easy when you are working with fantastic actors and when you do have a well-written script and great producers like Jana Matthews. I always say, like, acting is hard, being is easy So, we didn’t have to act in the scenarios because I think it was so relatable to all of us. A lot of the scenarios and stuff that we’re that we’re experiencing as the characters, were really, really easy to grasp on too. It was it was being me. He was being him, and and, you know, we’re all being parts of ourselves. You know? So, it was it was fun.
The Knockturnal: That ease radiated onscreen. Since Holidazed dives into different holiday traditions, I want to ask, do any of you have any niche holiday traditions that you thought were normal, then you ask someone and they say, “Nope, just you?”
John: As I’ve suggested, to the fellas, one thing unique to my family, as a child and now as an adult, is we do a family prayer around the Christmas tree on Christmas Eve. We hold hands, and you’re allowed to have the floor for as long as you want for whatever you want to say. Whether you want to acknowledge abundance or gratitude or if you’re 11 years old, you might have something very different to say than your 16-year-old sister or 27-year-old special needs brother. There’s no wrong; you can’t say anything wrong. I think that liberates people to express things that are really lovely.
Dennis: I grew up in a huge family. I had 6 brothers and 2 sisters. My mother and father, then grew as they got married and got children. So, now I have 27 great nieces and nephews. 9 or 10 nieces and nephews. When we used to get together, it was so powerful to hold hands and have a prayer before the meal, because my mother’s very religious, we could not get away with anything without a prayer. That energy was palpable.
Ser’Darius: My family’s from the Caribbean, so we do things a little bit differently. We have a very eclectic mixed group of traditions and cultures. But, we actually celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve. So we have a big giant Christmas Eve dinner, and you’ll pretty much never see, like, traditional foods on the table. We have everything from oxtails and curry goat, all sorts of stuff like that. So, like, a lot of really fantastic, you know, traditional Caribbean, you know, things at the table. Of course, the American side of our family will bring more American-style foods.
The Knockturnal: I love that. I’m Puerto Rican, so it’s the same for us. Christmas Eve is the celebration. Christmas Day is for sleeping in and leftovers. Again, thank you all for sitting down with The Knockturnal, congratulations on this fun series.
Cast: Lindy Booth, Osric Chau, Rachelle Lefevre
The Knockturnal: How’s everybody doing?
Lindy: So good. It’s like Christmas up in here.
Rachelle: So good.
Osric: We’re just reminiscing about the show.
The Knockturnal: I’m so excited to sit down with all of you today. The series is so exciting, it’s a fun holiday twist. You tackle old-school beliefs, running into high-school bullies, and all of the lights getting blown out. How much fun was it to bring this to the forefront?
Lindy: Well, I think one of the great things is that’s what the holiday is. Anyone who is pretending their Christmas or holiday is picture-perfect is lying to you. We all know that. I think one of the most amazing things about Holidazed is it brings up all the fun and drama and shows that you can love and hate someone in the exact same sentence, which I think every family can relate to.
Osric: I think it was just so relatable to see all these different types of relationships and the messiness of the holidays in a way that we haven’t really explored before. I thought that was really well done. I couldn’t be prouder to be part of a show like this.
Rachelle: I totally agree. I think there’s actually a story from set that kind of sums it up for me. We wanted to have fun and be zany, as it’s the holidays. We’re infusing it with comedy and lots of joy and everything. Then, Lindy and I, who play sisters, had this scene where we had this really intense fight. We weren’t sure where to go with it tonally. We’ve gotten along really well and, like, sisters. So, when it came time to have this argument, we were invested and we really went there. I remember us being a little nervous about how much can we do and our director and producer were, like “No. No. Like really go there. Have the fight.” We were, like, “Oh, like, real life at the holidays?”
Lindy: It’s like you can fight with someone and love someone. You can make up and you cannot make up. At the end of the day, it’s still Hallmark, but it’s also real life. It’s your family, and you’re stuck with them.
Osric: Well, I think you fight because there’s love there.
Rachelle: And you feel safe.
The Knockturnal: That comes across really well on screen. A big part of it was also exploring different traditions. Do any of you have any niche holiday traditions that you thought were normal, then you ask someone and they say, “Nope, just you?”
Lindy: That’s a good question. First of all, I’m Canadian, so I will often say things and be like, you know, Like this.” And people are like, “Yeah, we don’t do that. We’ve never heard of that.”
Osric: Like, scrambling Thanksgiving.
Rachelle: I was just going to say, you put a turkey in the oven in October, and people are like, “What’s wrong with you?” I’m also Canadian.
Lindy: It’s usually a jingle from, like, a childhood commercial. But one of my holiday traditions is my sister and I go to Santa’s runway, and I thought everyone knew what Santa’s runway was. So there’s a very fancy neighborhood in the town that I grew up in, and all those big houses do a very extensive and expansive and expensive light show, but they line the street with little paper bags full of candles. And it looks like a runway for Santa to come and land on. I think it’s beautiful, and we go every single year. I’m still going with my sister this year.
Rachelle: I grew up in Montreal where there’s a large Jewish population. So, it was normal for me that on Christmas day, like, all the Jews, we order Chinese food. This is the thing. That’s because the Chinese restaurants are always open. So Jews celebrate Christmas by ordering Chinese food takeout on Christmas day. This was so normal to me, and my biological father was not Jewish. So we did Christmas, and we ordered Chinese food.
I moved to Nashville a couple of years ago, and there are not to my knowledge, any Jewish people that live in my neighborhood. I have yet to meet a Jewish person who lives in my neighborhood. So, when Christmas rolled around, I sent out, like, messages to all my new friends. I was like, “If you guys wanna come over, we’re ordering Chinese food.” I swear, the messages I got back were people were so genuinely confused. They had never heard of this.
Osric: I mean, it’s funny because my tradition is going to Chinese restaurants with the Jewish people.
Rachelle: Oh my god. Are you kidding me?
Osric: No.
Rachelle: Oh my god. That’s amazing because that’s the only thing open.
Osric: Are you kidding me? That’s when I hang out with the Jewish people.
The Knockturnal: These are all such great traditions. The chemistry here is insane. The series is amazing. Congratulations, you guys. Thank you so much for sitting down with The Knockturnal.
All three: Thank you.
Holidazed is available for streaming now on Hallmark+.
