Hallmark's Gay Christmas Film Casts 'Mean Girls' Jonathan Bennett

He will star opposite Brad Harder and the pair are looking to adopt.

Mikelle Street

Mikelle is the former editorial director of digital for PrideMedia, guiding digital editorial and social across Out, The Advocate, Pride.com, Out Traveler, and Plus. After starting as a freelancer for Out in 2013, he joined the staff as Senior Editor working across print and digital in 2018. In early 2021 he became Out's digital director, marking a pivot to content that centered queer and trans stories and figures, exclusively. In September 2021, he was promoted to editorial director of PrideMedia. He has written cover stories on Ricky Martin, Miss Fame, Nyle DiMarco, Jeremy O. Harris, Law Roach, and Symone.

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Mikelle Street

September 24 2020 7:14 AM EST

May 31 2023 4:09 PM EST

MikelleStreet

2020 is the year of the queer Christmas it seems. In addition to Lifetime's The Christmas Setup, which will feature the real-life married actors Blake Lee and Ben Lewis as one-time crushes whose paths cross again, and Clea DuVall's Happiest Season which stars Kristen Stewart as a character proposing to her girlfriend, the Hallmark Channel is ready to make the yuletide gay. And they are hoping Mean Girlscan help them do so.

For their first holiday film that features an LGBTQ+ storyline, the much-watched network has cast Jonathan Bennett of Mean Girls fame as a lead. In the project, which is titled The Christmas House, Bennett will play Brandon. The character has returned home with his husband, played by Brad Harder, while they "are anxiously awaiting a call about the adoption of their first child." They spend the time with the family which is rounded out by brother Mike, played by Robert Buckley, and parents Bill and Phylis, played by Treat Williams and Sharon Lawrence respectively.

"Our holiday table is bigger and more welcoming than ever," Michelle Vicary, executive vice president, programming said in the network's announcement. "Our movies are rooted in warmth and positivity, meaningful connections, family gatherings, and seasonal traditions - a winning formula we hope will bring our millions of viewers much-needed levity and holiday cheer at the end of a tough year."

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The movie will join the annual "Countdown to Christmas" slate of projects that will begin airing on November 23. It comes after years of criticism that the network did not show a diversity of narratives. This criticism heightened last December when the network pulled an ad that featured a same-sex couple. Days prior to that, a report found that there wasn't a single major LGBTQ+ character in the channel's 2019 Christmas lineup and the CEO said they were "open" to the idea.

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