Kimberley Nixon shoots festive rom-com A Cottage Christmas
- Fresh Meat star Kimberley Nixon has filmed festive rom-com A Cottage Christmas, shot over 15 days in Dorset
- Co-starring Poppy Gilbert and Lewis Griffith, Nixon plays an American event planner who comes to the UK to arrange her half-sister's wedding but ends up finding an unexpected romance of her own
- "Kimberley has great dramatic and comedic acting skills on camera but away from the set, she's totally hilarious with her witty and occasionally weird insights into the world!" said director Danny Stack
Kimberley Nixon has shot a festive rom-com film, British Comedy Guide can exclusively reveal
The Fresh Meat and Hebburn star is the lead in A Cottage Christmas, alongside Poppy Gilbert, the actor who played the title character in ITV assumed identity drama Chloe.
Nixon plays an American event planner in the movie who comes to the UK to arrange her younger half-sister's wedding in time for Christmas Eve but finds an unexpected romance of her own in the process.
Gilbert plays her slightly kooky half-sister, while newcomer Lewis Griffith is Nixon's love interest.
Shot in 15 days around Bournemouth and Poole last month and also featuring Russell Clive Biles and Jenni Bowden, A Cottage Christmas is set to be published on a major streaming platform in December, with a cinema release yet to be confirmed.
The film is directed by Danny Stack and Tim Clague, with Adam J Merrifield producing for Reel One Entertainment, the same team that made sci-fi family film Future TX, starring Griff Rhys Jones, about to screen in cinemas internationally.
"This was our first ever Christmas movie, and Reel One's first UK Christmas movie, so we wanted to ensure we made something special" Stack told BCG. "We built a very cute Christmas market and got snow special effects which created a lot of festive magic for the cast and crew in the middle of March!
"We absolutely, genuinely 100% had a blast with Kimberley, Poppy and Lewis. Kimberley has great dramatic and comedic acting skills on camera but away from the set, she's totally hilarious with her witty and occasionally weird insights into the world!
"Poppy's a rising star in TV & film, we feel very lucky to have nabbed her for this role, and she brought a lot of fun and energy as the quirky 'bride to be'. Lewis is such a devastatingly handsome man, but so modest, down-to-earth and funny too, damn him. Together, it really was a dream team, and we had a lot of laughs on and off camera."
Time travel caper Future TX, which was similarly shot in Bournemouth and Poole, and stars Rhys Jones, Adele Congreve and Arran Kemp, was shown in Odeon cinemas last year and has just been picked up for cinema release by US distributor Level 33.
The experience of making the sci-fi film taught the filmmakers "a lot about delivering a lot of 'bang for your buck' on a modest budget" said Stack. "So we know how to maximise the impact of every production department to get a story's full entertainment value on screen."