Fans of Hallmark Channel movies are very familiar with Nikki DeLoach, who was last seen in the network’s Reunited at Christmas, which she also developed and executive produced, and before that she starred in Truly, Madly, Sweetly; Christmas Land; A Dream of Christmas; and The Perfect Catch.
But this Saturday, when Love to the Rescue premieres, DeLoach, who also starred as Lacey Hamilton on the critically-acclaimed series Awkward for five seasons, is playing a character that she says is more like her than any other.
“The character is an artist; she’s a real free spirit,” DeLoach tells Parade.com in this exclusive interview. “You don’t often get to see those types of characters come down the pipe for Hallmark. They’re usually more traditional characters. When I read Kate, I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh. This is it! This person [writer Sarah Montana] knew me and wrote me into a movie.’ It’s probably the closest I’ve ever played to myself.”
Love to the Rescue follows Kate (DeLoach), a free-spirited single mother whose daughter convinces her to share custody of a rescue dog with a single father (Michael Rady as Eric) with a son. The interaction which results challenges Kate to confront her fear of falling in love again.
The reluctance to jump into a relationship is something else that DeLoach has in common with Kate, but for a very different reason, since DeLoach has been married to Ryan Goodell, with whom she has two sons, since September 5, 2009.
“I believe that love is something that grows, I do,” she says. “I also, by the way, was never a person who enjoyed dating. For me, I was more of a let-me-get-to-know-you-a-little-bit person and then maybe let’s go get dinner. Let’s hang out a little bit, let’s talk about each other’s lives, let me hear about you and then when I feel comfortable, then maybe you and I can go to a movie or something like that. So, I’m definitely a love grows kind of person.”
Hallmark makes in the neighborhood of 100 movies a year, what made Love to the Rescue standout?
Actually, it was a couple of things. It was the first time I was going to get to work with Michael Rady. I’m sure glad I said yes because he really and truly might be one of my favorite male co-stars I’ve ever worked with in my life. He’s so talented and of the nicest human beings. We just had so much fun on this movie.
The other reason was the script. This was Sarah Montana’s first script at Hallmark. She’s very young and it was almost perfect. Her voice was as if she knew me and she wrote it for me because the voice was so much the kind of stuff I love to do. There was a lot of comedy in this script, which I love to do, and there’s a lot of heart to it and a lot of playfulness.
So, there were 1000 reasons for me to say yes, plus I love working with Hallmark. They’re so good to me. They’re family at this point.
You’re a mom. How realistic do you think it is that Kate would sacrifice her personal happiness for her daughter?
If you want my honest opinion, I think it’s very realistic. I know from being a mom of two that when Bennett came along — Bennett was my second — and Bennett was a hard baby. We found out when he was in utero that there were a lot of things I had to sacrifice in order to make sure that he was okay and I would do it time and time and time and time and time again.
Sometimes is necessary for you to sacrifice things that you may want to do as a human being for things that you really need to do as a mother, right? And sometimes, like in Kate’s situation, what she comes to realize is that she can trust herself and that’s really what it was about.
For Kate, she had tried with her ex and it didn’t work out and it was so hard for their family when they divorced that she just blamed herself for making this big mistake. She blamed herself for not being able to make it work and then she blamed herself because it hurt her daughter so much.
So, really and truly what it was, was her not wanting to repeat that same hurt for her daughter. So, it wasn’t her sacrificing her personal happiness as much as her saying, “I never want my daughter to hurt that way again. I never want to make another mistake that’s going to impact her.” I think that we, as parents, do that all the time, where we love our children more than anything else in this world and they come first all the time.
You said that Kate is the closest to you that you’ve ever played, which brings up the question: Are you a no rules person like she is, or are you more like Eric, where you do have some rules, you just don’t laminate them?
I do have rules. It’s so fun to have rules, isn’t it? I am very much an artist, I am very much a free spirit and I love to have dance parties every day, but I also have rules because I really and truly feel that kids thrive with boundaries and with structure. I always say to my son, “There’s a time to work and there’s a time to play, so right now we have to do our responsibilities, which means we have to put our jackets and our lunch boxes up, and wash our hands and put our shoes away. Then as soon as we’re done doing that, we can have fun.” In terms of discipline and raising my kids, I’m definitely a mixture between Kate and Eric.
It’s consistency. I’m reading a book right now called Common Sense Parenting and the one thing it stresses over and over and over again is consistency, which I already knew. Actually, when I was pregnant with Hudson and I was about to give birth to him, I asked my sister, who had two children at the time, “What’s the best parenting advice that you can give me?” And she’s like, “Consistency, even when you’re tired, even when you don’t feel like it, even when it does not matter, always be consistent.” I was like, “Huh, that’s very interesting.” So, I really take that to heart and, truthfully, I know with my child that he thrives when he has structure and boundaries. They actually perceive it as loving them because you’re paying attention and you’re caring. They actually internalize it as being cared for, so it is very important.
I think that Kate’s reluctance to jump head first into a relationship with Eric makes this movie more real for me, but I also love the pup.
Yeah, Zipp is pretty, pretty good. I’m not going to lie, he was really funny because in the beginning he wouldn’t do anything on camera. We were like, “Wait a second! This dog is in two-thirds of the movie, what do you mean he doesn’t know any tricks?” We were like freaking out because he was supposed to do all these tricks in the movie and then, finally, we realized the only thing he could actually do was just sit and look really cute. We were, “You know what? That actually is going to be enough. Look at him, he’s so cute.”
Nikki DeLoach’s Heart Soars in Hallmark Hall of Fame’s World Premiere of Love Takes Flight
You talked about how good Hallmark is to you and now you’re filming another movie for them.
This one, actually, is a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie that I’m doing. It’s a really big deal. I was pretty shocked. I was like, “Oh, my God. This is amazing.” I was very honored. The Hallmark Hall of Fame movies are one of the longest TV traditions, and I just am very honored to have now joined that tradition.
Love to the Rescue premieres Saturday, March 23 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Hallmark Channel.
https://parade.com/863194/paulettecohn/nikki-deloach-talks-parenting-pups-and-love-at-first-sight-for-hallmark-channels-love-to-the-rescue/
2019-03-22 14:05:36Z
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