A sweet holiday treat is coming fans' way! The Bold and the Beautiful staple John McCook (Eric Forrester) will be joining his daughter, Molly McCook, and Food Network star Ree Drummond in Candy Coated Christmas, the first original film for Discovery+.
According to an official press release, the holly and jolly movie will star Molly McCook in the leading role of Molly Gallant, a Los Angeles-based marketing executive who heads to Peppermint Hollow -- a.k.a. the peppermint capital of the world -- in an attempt to find start-up money for a new business venture.
Peppermint Hollow is Molly's mother's hometown, and she's invited to stay in her mom's childhood home by the family that currently lives there. The opportunity offers Molly the chance to reconnect to her own childhood memories, and the possibility for a newly "minted" business begins to take shape.
Drummond, famous for her cooking show The Pioneer Woman, will appear in the movie as Bee, the owner of a bakery in Peppermint Hollow, who introduces Molly to the friendly denizens that reside in the super sweet town.
"Candy Coated Christmas was so much fun to be part of; it had all the magical elements that make holiday movies so special," Drummond enthuses about being part of the film. "Any initial nerves I felt about joining this project completely melted away when I stepped into the sweet, charming world of Peppermint Hollow!"
There's no word yet on who John McCook will be playing or how his character will fit into the storyline, but he was joined by Aaron O'Connell and Jae Suh Park in the film, which wrapped production this week.
According to Variety, Discovery plans to create a host of supplemental content around Candy Coated Christmas, such as recipes and other material for Food Network. The hope is that the film will be a model for more special efforts around big promotable events such as the holidays.
"Now that we've got Discovery+ it's the perfect opportunity to stretch our niche content envelope," says Kathleen Finch, Discovery's chief lifestyle brands officer. "So much of what we're doing right now is looking at how do we take our niche genres -- food, home, crime -- and expand them in ways we might not be able to do on linear. We can put them on Discovery+ and market it in a different way. We are finding new ways to make our content available."
What are your thoughts on the casting and premise of Candy Coated Christmas? We want to hear from you -- so drop your comments in the Comments section below, tweet about it on Twitter, share it on Facebook, or chat about it on our Message Boards.
