Netflix Holiday Movie To Film In New Canaan

NEW CANAAN, CT — A Netflix movie starring Justin Hartley of "This Is Us" fame will be filming at a home in New Canaan this week, and a bigger scene is planned to shoot in front of Town Hall next month.

Michael Fucci, a location manager on the film "The Noel Diary," told members of the town's Police Commission during their meeting Wednesday the first day of filming would take place at a home on Wydendown Road.

"There's two scenes," Fucci said during the virtual meeting. "There's a car that drives down the block, gets to the house, our actor gets out and walks into the home. The other scenes take place inside the home."

According to Fucci, the production plans to do its staging at the St. Mark's Episcopal Church on Oenoke Ridge, where everything would be contained to their property and the properties adjacent to the Wydendown Road home.

"I talked to Lt. [Jason] Ferraro about this," Fucci said. "Everyone seems to be on board in theory, just pending a little bit more information."

The second proposed day of filming in town is a little more elaborate. According to Fucci, the production would return on June 27 to film a couple scenes on Elm Street around 6 p.m. before filming a bigger scene in front of Town Hall on Main Street.

Fucci compared the planned scale of the Main Street scene to the opening moments of the 1983 holiday classic "A Christmas Story."

"We want to put up one of those giant blow up screens," Fucci said, "and I think we're going to be showing 'It's a Wonderful Life', and there's just tons of holiday and Christmas festivities going on: an ice skating rink, a little snow hill, booths everywhere, old school cars, a pretty big scene."

Filming would take place from approximately 8 p.m. until dawn, which would necessitate a road closure on Main Street, between Locust Avenue and East Avenue, from 7 p.m. on June 27 until 7 a.m. the following morning, Fucci said.

Commission member Shekaiba Bennett asked if residents would still be able to access the restaurants in the area during the closure.

"We're going to get the restaurants on board like we would do in any other town," Fucci said.

Fucci noted the restaurants will close around 10 or 11 p.m., so the bulk of the scene is only going to involve a few hours of restaurant closures at most. The restaurants would be asked to hold while actual filming takes place, Fucci said.

"It's a Christmas movie," Fucci said, "so it'll look a little strange [with] people with shorts and t-shirts walking down the block. So just as if we were shooting anywhere else, we would have [production assistants] on the corner respectfully asking residents to just a hold a second while we get the shot and then we would get them in."

Commission Chairman Paul Foley asked if firefighters would be able to get out of the station, which is also located on Main Street, during the shoot.

"We're very cognizant of emergency vehicles," Fucci said. "We do this every single day, and we would never do anything to prevent an emergency vehicle from getting by at any time."

He also noted the production plans to put a big wreath on the station and have a vintage fire truck there during filming.

All three commission members approved the road closure, and Foley noted he hoped Fucci would return to New Canaan for future productions.

"We want to make it easy for you to work with us," Foley said, "and to come back."

Fucci described "The Noel Diary" as a holiday movie about a famous young writer whose mother passes away, leaving him in charge of her estate.

"He discovers this mysterious diary that kind of takes him down a road," Fucci said, "and he finds a lot about his family. It's a little road trip movie between him and someone that he meets that has to do with the diary, so no matter where we go we're going to be making snow, and it's going to be a lot of fun."

The film will likely be released on Netflix next year, Fucci said. Bonnie Bedelia and Treat Williams will also star alongside Hartley, according the Internet Movie Database.

Charles Shyer, whose credits include "Father of the Bride" and "Alfie," will direct the film, which is based on a novel by Richard Paul Evans.

Filming for "The Noel Diary" comes right on the heels of filming for another Netflix movie, "The Good Nurse," which shot scenes in Stamford, Fairfield and Norwalk this year.

The commission meeting can be viewed in full here.