Netflix to Film Christmas Scenes in Essex Village - Zip06.com

By Elizabeth Reinhart/Zip06.com • 05/25/2021 02:22 p.m. EST

A production crew from the streaming service, Netflix, will be in Essex Village over the Memorial Day weekend to film several winter scenes for the Christmas movie, The Noel Diary.

“It’s another one of those winter wonderland scenes,” said Essex First Selectman Norman Needleman. “The logistics are a little complicated, over the Memorial Day weekend, but we believe that it’s doable without that much inconvenience and it’s really neat for the town.”

The film will star Justin Hartley of the television drama This is Us. Bonnie Bedelia and Treat Williams are also part of the cast. It will be directed by Charles Shyer, who directed Alfie and Father of the Bride, according to the Internet Movie Database, IMDb.

The cast and crew will be in Essex for a day and a half of filming, according to a member of the production team, speaking to the Courier on a condition of anonymity.

The Griswold Inn, and its shops, will be the main set of the film.

“It all happens there,” he said. “We’re going to make it a real holiday experience with Christmas decorations and fake snow.”

In 2018, the Griswold Inn was featured in Hallmark’s Christmas movie, Christmas at Pemberley Manor.

It’s another reason that the location appealed to Netflix.

“Essex has been film-friendly in the past and whenever there is an open door, we tend to go back. We are creatures of habit,” the production team member said, adding, “Essex does fit the bill as that perfect postcard town.”

In addition to the Memorial Day holiday, the filming will also closely align with an important milestone of the COVID-19 pandemic in Connecticut, Governor Ned Lamont’s lifting of most business restrictions, approximately a week earlier on May 19.

There are stringent COVID-19 safety protocols on the set that include testing requirements and measures that have been in place from the start of the pandemic like mask wearing and increased cleaning. The use of zones, or areas with restricted access, serve to protect the actors.

“We’re trying to keep them as distanced from the rest of the crew and the public as much as possible,” said the member of Netflix’s production team. “Obviously, if they get sick, the whole show goes down, right? In terms of, we can’t film. They can’t be replaced.”

Bedelia is well known for her role in the action movies Die Hard and Die Hard 2. She also played the mother in the 2010 to 2015 television drama Parenthood.

Williams rose to fame for his role in the 1979 film Hair. He most recently played a leading role in the 2002 to 2006 television series, Everwood.

Hartley will star in the film and executive produce The Noel Diary, which is adapted from a novel of the same name by Richard Paul Evans, published in 2017.

The plot centers on Hartley, who plays an author who returns home after the death of his estranged mother and uncovers a diary.

This diary “may hold secrets to his own past and that of a beautiful young woman on a mysterious journey of her own,” according to IMDb.

The release date for the film was not available.

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