Sarah Drew appears in a scene from Mistletoe Murders.StackTV
A dollop of crime, a dash of romance, a touch of intrigue, a truckload of tinsel: Mistletoe Murders, the Canadian, Audible Original podcast, found that candy-cane-sweet spot the minute it debuted on Nov. 30, 2022. Created by Ken Cuperus (Hudson & Rex), its Audible categories are “cozy” and “feel-good.” Its theme song is Tchaikovsky’s Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy, slowed down to sound lightly sinister. Its episodes have titles like “Hung by the Chimney” and “U Better Watch Out.” Its deaths are discreet; its cuss words occasional. Its mysteries are solvable, even to listeners who are busy folding laundry or peeling potatoes.
And it’s a bona fide Canadian success story: a 4.9 (out of 5) star rating. User reviews dotted with exclamation points. A second and third season, out this month. A French-language version for Quebec, and in other languages for other territories. And now a television version co-produced by Hallmark and Lionsgate, newly arrived on W, Stack TV and the streaming service Hallmark+.
Its heroine, single cat lady Emily Lane – played by Cobie Smulders (How I Met Your Mother) in the podcast, and Sarah Drew (Grey’s Anatomy) in the series – recently relocated to charming Fletcher’s Grove in Ontario’s cottage country, where she owns Under the Mistletoe, a year-round Christmas store. But hints of her murky past drift down like snowflakes: Her parents died when she was 8. Her foster homes were not cozy. She shies away from romance with local cop Sam Wilner (Ginny & Georgia’s Raymond Ablack in the podcast; Rookie Blue’s Peter Mooney in the series), despite their chemistry.
Emily can pick locks, converse with shady sources, read body language. She’s a wiseacre in her voiceover narration – “Laughing at ourselves is something we should all do, and Canadians are good at it,” Smulders said during a video interview in October – but she’s also seen “more than her share of dead bodies,” and is haunted by “the ghosts of lives that can’t be unreined.” In other words, she’s Christmas-mystery crack.
“In a lot of our episodes, the criminals confess: ‘Uh-oh, you got me,’” Smulders says, laughing. “Emily fights for her friends and her community. And the good guys win, which is comforting.”
Cuperus, a self-proclaimed “Christmas nerd,” originally developed Mistletoe Murders as a Canadian TV series, but Audible was looking for mysteries, and his tone was a good fit. “I’m a blue-sky writer, I’m not a dark, True Detective guy,” he said in a separate video interview. “I grew up on 1980s shows like Magnum PI and Murder, She Wrote – kinder, gentler murders that you can have some fun with. The characters are quirky, you don’t need a shower when you’re done watching. That’s my zone.”
Used to working with lean Canadian TV budgets, Cuperus found the unrestrained possibilities of audio freeing: He could do a chase scene with just feet pounding and actors panting. A huge explosion is merely a sound effect.
He could also hire his dream cast. Smulders records her lines in a studio near her Los Angeles home – “There’s no hair and makeup, you roll in in your jammies,” she says. “There’s something magical about just you and a page, and it’s up to you to create a moment for somebody who’s driving in their car or sitting in front of the fire with a hot cup of cocoa.”
Anna Cathcart (XO, Kitty) plays Violet, Sam’s daughter, who works at Emily’s store. Jean Yoon (Kim’s Convenience) plays Sue, whose diner is a snow globe of town gossip. A who’s-who of Canadians guest star, including Drew Scott, Enrico Colantoni, Jayne Eastwood, Tamara Podemski and Eric Peterson.
Cuperus likes to “play fair” with his audience. He made a decision at the beginning not to overcomplicate the mysteries, so even frazzled families can follow along. Though every character has a motive for the murder, Agatha Christie style, and even popular characters can be offed at any time, he gives listeners all the pieces to solve his puzzles. “Ten minutes before the end of each two-part mystery, you’ll have all the information you need,” he says. “There’s nothing worse than a mystery whose reveal you couldn’t possibly have known.”
In a feel-good twist, after the podcast hit, TV came caroling. Cuperus talked to Lionsgate, who talked to Hallmark, and the green light arrived so fast, “nobody had time to do the standard Canadian television thing of developing something for way longer than it needs,” he says. His podcast stars weren’t available, but that wasn’t a problem – aside from the first two episodes, the series will feature different mysteries. And because it’s for Hallmark+, he’ll be able to be a tad edgier than the main network’s fare, with characters who are alcoholics, gamblers, drug users. The podcast is clearly Canadian – butter tarts get a shout-out – while the series is more Anytown, Anyplace.
Audiences’ appetite for Christmas-themed entertainment is like Santa’s appetite for cookies: insatiable. Smulders thinks it’s innate to human biology. “We’re supposed to be hibernating, right?” she asks. “Go into the cave, snuggle up, see you when the sun comes back? So this time of year excuses us to slow down, sleep in, stay home. That’s the idea, anyway. I’m a parent, so that doesn’t really exist. But the feeling is, people are their most giving, patient, empathetic. And I get to be in my home with the people I love most.”
Cuperus agrees: “You can step back from your feuds and be nice to everybody. I didn’t have an awesome childhood. I was adopted into a shouty house in Winnipeg. We didn’t all get along. Even untangling Christmas lights was stressful. So I’m chasing the idea of Christmas I never had as a kid.”
His family now decorates a giant Christmas tree. They wear matching pajamas. They try to watch a different Christmas movie each night in December. They drive around other neighbourhoods to look at Christmas lights. He owns a vast collection of Christmas records and has to restrain himself from playing them before Dec. 1. So yes, he’ll have a jolly time baking Christmas mysteries “for as long as Audible and Hallmark will have us,” he says. “Our joke is that Mistletoe could be our Grey’s Anatomy, and run and run and run.”
That’s on Smulders’ wish list, too. “I’ll keep doing it as long as people want to hear about murdering at Christmastime,” she says, eyes twinkling. “Which, oddly, I hope is forever.”
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