If you interviewed a celebrity screenwriter whose Christmas romantic comedy just aired on Netflix to rave reviews and made the streaming service's top 10, would you expect the Zoom call to be delightful and fun? 

What if I told you the writer was the showrunner on two series with dark subject matter like the crime/mystery Good Behavior and the sci-fi/mystery Wayward Pines? (Insert slightly worried face here.)

Zooming in from Los Angeles, Chad Hodge (who wrote Single All the Way, the breakout Christmas hit of the season) was delightful and fun — so much so that this interviewer hardly asked any of her prepared questions and instead just got lost in chitchat. Having watched the movie twice in four days, I fangirled about how impressed I was that Netflix’s first gay Christmas rom-com:

1. Got made during a pandemic.
2. Attracted a cast of well-loved movie stars.
3. Ended up being the high-quality piece it is (the writing contributing greatly to this).

Typically, Christmas romance movies — and especially those made for TV networks — do not have large budgets but instead make up for this fact with Christmas décor and gingerbread houses. Single All the Way likely had a larger budget than most. It was Netflix. They had Whitney and Britney songs, a trained dog, child actors, elaborately decorated sets and stars like Jennifer Coolidge, Kathy Najimy, Barry Bostwick as well as Michael Urie (who stars as the romantic lead). This movie even has Jennifer Robertson from Schitt’s Creek and if that isn’t a feather in the cap, what is, people?

Single All the Way is the story of a gay man returning home for Christmas to New Hampshire, where his family wants to see him find love and settle down (specifically back in their small town). They don’t see much of him because he lives in Los Angeles and they miss him. Peter (Urie) convinces his best friend and roommate, Nick (Philemon Chambers), to come home with him for Christmas and pretend they are a couple to avoid the pressure to find a mate. Before that pretense is launched, however, Peter’s mom (Najimy) announces she’s set him up with the only gay man in town, newcomer and personal trainer James (played by Canadian Luke Macfarlane of Hallmark-Christmas-movie royalty). It’s a cute premise.

In our interview, I asked Hodge how someone who wrote the complicated romantic relationship of Letty and Javier in Good Behavior came to be tapped to write a Christmas rom-com. Turns out, if I’d scrolled far enough down his IMDb page, I would see he wrote several romance movies for ABC Family long ago. Hodge went on to say that like most screenwriters, he enjoys writing other genres (not just complicated and dark crime and mystery series).

Long before the pandemic hit, Netflix wanted a gay Christmas rom-com and contacted Joel S. Rice, producer at Muse Entertainment. Having produced those movies at ABC Family 15 years earlier, Rice remembered that Hodge knew his way around a rom-com. Since writing I Want to Marry Ryan Banks, Hodge had gone on to other projects, much like the star of that movie, Bradley Cooper. But Hodge hadn’t forgotten how to write romance. As a gay man, the opportunity to write Netflix’s first gay Christmas romance was something he was eager to be part of and he signed on as writer and executive producer. When Hodge began writing the movie, he didn’t want to take the obvious route and make the conflict about being gay or hiding that from family. He wanted to write about a family who loves Peter for who he is.

With a Wayward Pines sign on a shelf behind him and sleeping dogs under his neat desk, Hodge was eager to talk about getting this movie made after writing it three years ago. Although he doesn’t usually cast characters as he’s writing, there was something about Coolidge that had him writing Aunt Sandy for her. (This was years before The White Lotus would make her a household name.)

Soon the script was sent to Netflix, and they loved it. Michael Mayer of Smash and 27 Dresses signed on to direct and as they moved from development to pre-production for a 2020 Christmas release, a pandemic hit the world like a ton of bricks. Stars were put on hold, many of whom had joined the cast wanting to be part of the first gay romance in the Netflix Christmas lineup. After a year’s wait, in March 2021 production began in Montreal, Canada, where there was still real snow on the ground. Keep in mind, Canada did not let anyone into their country easily in 2021. The talent and crew endured two weeks of hotel quarantine as well as testing before they could start work. And at that time, unless it was for work purposes, Americans could not enter Canada. Najimy wanted to bring her husband, Dan Finnerty, to Montreal but he couldn’t cross the border. Meet Kevin, the snowplow driver who sings in the bar. The singer of THE DAN BAND happened to have a great song already written, which he could use for the movie. Then at some point during filming, Hodge asked Finnerty to write a song for the final credits, a song now available on Spotify called “Single All the Way.”

I asked Hodge if all lines were scripted or if anyone improvised.

“Jennifer has a background in improv so she would do her scene as written, then on another take she’d change it up,” he said.

I asked if the cast and crew thought she was funny and Hodge said, “Absolutely. When we called ‘cut,’ everyone laughed and she’d crack up, making herself laugh.”

In the film, Aunt Sandy says, “The gays just know how to do stuff. And for some reason, they’re always obsessed with me.”( Not improvised, but proudly written by Hodge himself.)

Urie, the romantic lead, has a long history of hits going back to regular characters on Ugly Betty and Modern Family. However, his character’s romantic interest, Nick, was cast as a relative newcomer. Hodge describes finding Chambers as a stroke of genius by the casting directors. The chemistry between Urie and Chambers is off the charts as it builds to the final payoff and Hodge says the day they shot the big kissing scene, they knew they had something special when the crew cheered.

No one in the movie phones in a performance — including the dog — making the finished product one of the best Christmas movies I’ve ever seen and the best Christmas rom-com since The Holiday. It’s not just a movie for the LGBTQ crowd. It’s a classic Christmas family story about two people finding love and deserves to be in the Netflix Top 10 right now. Stream It Or Skip It, an online movie rating show, recently declared that out of 100 new Christmas movies this year, Single All the Way takes the top place. Understandably, the gay community is thrilled to have a mainstream movie depicting gay love, with social media blowing up with comments like this: 

“As a queer Black man, I just want to say there has only been one other movie that has made
me feel seen and that’s Black Panther, but I can now add Single All the Way to that list. Thanks
to Chad Hodge for writing the perfect Christmas film.”

Doing that for someone who previously felt left out and marginalized has got to feel good as a screenwriter. Well done, Chad Hodge.