Brooks Darnell on Hallmark’s First Kwanzaa Movie, Holiday Heritage, and his Many Other Talents

As everyone knows by now, Hallmark networks have been tackling different kinds of content, and this year, we’re treated to a look at Kwanzaa with Holiday Heritage.

Brooks Darnell stars alongside Lyndie Greenwood and Holly Robinson Peete as Griffin, the mayor of a small town who helps a local family and his ex-girlfriend celebrate Christmas and Kwanzaa.

We spoke with Brooks about starring in the movie and so much more.

I read up on you and discovered that despite your acting talent being recognized early, you went to school for pre-med on a football scholarship.

Yes, I did. Unfortunately, because let me tell you, that’s a lot of work. And I have two younger brothers who actually have two degrees each. And that was kind of the thing in our family, was it’s not enough to have a bachelor’s degree.

You have to have a master’s or a Ph.D. And they both have their master’s. Yeah, that was the big thing for me was going to school to be a doctor because I figured, hey, they make the most money from the professions my mom gave us to choose from.

Good old mom.

Yeah. Well the crazy thing is now my mom’s an actress.

Oh, you’re kidding?

No.

Did she get into it through you?

Yes and no. It was inspiration and encouragement. And I’m the only one she told at first. And then, even now, we still talk, and I kind of point her in the right direction. She’ll probably move out to L.A. and really give it a go. Yeah, she’s done about ten commercials.

Wow. That’s really exciting.

Yeah. At 60-something.

You have a talented family.

Yeah. Well, listen, I was the black sheep for a while because, like I told you, it was all about school. But now it’s a little bit different.

You’ve done quite a few of these TV movies now. What do you like about working in this genre?

It makes people smile. It’s warm and makes people smile. And here’s the thing, they watch them over and over and over again. And that’s what I like about it, is it’s something you can literally get something from every time you watch it. And it makes you feel good. I think that’s why people come back to them.

I think that’s why with The countdown to Christmas, they can play all of our movies. It’s just a fun time, and you can sit back and let the movies happen to you instead of really focusing on what’s going on. You just have fun with it.

That’s a good way to put it. You can let the movie happen. And they do. That’s exactly how it works.

Yeah.

So tell me about Heritage Holiday and your role as Griffin and how you got involved, and all that fun stuff.

So my team called me and said, “We have a movie for you.” Well, actually, it came from the network. The network sent it over, and then my team said, “We have a movie for you. Do you want to do it?” And I said, “Well, send it over.”

I read the script, and I was like, “You know what, this is something we haven’t seen on Hallmark before.” Or at least I haven’t seen.

Me either.

So I said, first of all, to be the first to do something, I’m always with that. There’s a chance, but Hallmark is family. If they think I can do it, then I’m like, “Cool. I can do it.” And they told me who my costars were. And I was like, “Holly, are you kidding me? Come on.” So it was a no-brainer.

And then Lyndie, I was like, “Definitely a no-brainer.” And then [director] Alfons [Adetuyi], I knew his work going into it. I liked the script. I thought it was well done. We were able to cover two holidays in 90 minutes.

I was like, that’s very hard to do. But we did it well. And you can really feel Kwanza, but you can also feel the warmth and the joy and the history of Christmas. It’s just a good movie.

What was it like working with both Lyndie and Holly?

Great. Great. Holly is super, super funny. I didn’t realize how funny she was until we worked together. She had me cracking up the whole time.

I usually give my cast a gift or a welcome or something like that, and I bought both of them a chocolate cake. And that ended up being my name throughout the whole movie from Holly was chocolate cake. I guess it helped that I am chocolate.

So if you look on one or two of our posts, that’s what the little piece of chocolate cake is, is she was calling me chocolate cake throughout the whole movie.

Oh, that’s cute.

Yeah. And she had a song back in the day called Holly Don’t Care, so that was her nickname for me, Holly Don’t Care. And I was chocolate cake. And we just bonded and had a great time. And Lyndie and I … It’s not difficult, but you don’t have enough time to bond with one person on some of these movies.

But I ended up bonding with both of the women on these movies, and they were just lovely. I call Lyndie, Lyndie-Poo. It was just that kind of family thing.

Griffin has it pretty difficult in the movie, interacting with three generations of strong women. He holds his own, though.

I just did what the script told me to do and let it lead me, and just be generous and accepting and inviting. And then it just took care of itself. I think that’s what you have to do when you have, again, strong women that you’re leading with, that you have just to be generous and giving and just let the script do its thing.

I really like that the story incorporates both Christmas and Kwanzaa. Like you said, you hadn’t seen anything like it. Neither had I.

Yeah, no. And it does it well. It’s one thing to take a stab at it and then say, “Okay, we missed the mark.” But it does it well, and you really feel like … If you like Kwanzaa, you get enough of it. If you like Christmas, you get your fill.

So it’s important, and it is really done well. And it’s well acted, and it’s well lit. It’s well-directed. Production did it right. Everything is great about it.

And do you celebrate both holidays? Do you celebrate Christmas and Kwanzaa?

I do. I try to celebrate them as evenly as possible. But a lot of the movies that we watch are Christmas movies.

Oh, sure.

This’ll be nice to be able to start celebrating Kwanzaa movie-wise because a lot of the movies we watch are the classics, and they’re mainly Christmas. But it’ll be good to have this one to put on the mantle to say, “Okay, we got to watch that Kwanzaa movie too.”

Honestly, I didn’t know a lot about Kwanzaa, but I really enjoyed learning about it and seeing it. Whenever I see something, it helps me. And seeing the traditions and the food — I actually looked up ground nut stew because it looked amazing.

Yeah. Listen, we’re the same. We’re probably all putting the same stuff in the stew. The season is the same. But yeah, same here. I learned some stuff on the movie about Kwanzaa.

I learned some more of the principles because I only knew a few of the principles, or remembered a few. My mom said, “We taught you all of that stuff.” And I’m like, “Yeah, but.”

Yeah, that doesn’t work that way.

Yeah. So relearning things and letting things sink in a little bit more, especially going through it in the movie. It helps, and it feels good. Same thing with Hanukkah.

I learned a little bit about Hanukkah from some of my friends and celebrate Hanukkah with them. It’s good to know because I think what happens is you realize that it’s kind of all the same, just seasoned different.

Right. Right. I was impressed with the seven principles too. What little I did know did not include those. What a nice way to incorporate community and all those values. It’s really impressive.

Yeah, which is very important. It’s very important, especially nowadays, with the disconnect with social media and stuff. I think it’s very important to have those principles at the core of what you do.

Did you feel like you were doing something special, making a movie with this dual holiday direction?

Oh, of course. Of course. And it’s less, I think, about the dual holiday. But it is both of them, and being handled right. You know what I mean? And they’re handled through the lenses that they’re supposed to be handled through. Kudos to Hallmark for having a Black director, for having a Black cast, to get the feel of it right, from the conception, the writers.

I think those things are important. Denzel said it best, it’s not color; it’s culture. Could somebody that was white have done it? Yes. Could they have done it well? Probably.

But there may have been some cultural elements that may not have been hammered home or that may have been missed. So I think that’s the important thing to remember. It’s not color, it’s culture.

What are some of your favorite traditions for both holidays?

Trees. Putting the tree up. Ever since I was young and stepped on a lot of needles, I don’t do real trees anymore. Putting the tree up. We were just talking about that on this movie today, your number-one Christmas movie of all time. And mine has to be Home Alone 2. Well, I said Home Alone 2 is a 100. And Elf is 99.995.

Yeah, I’m an Elf girl.

You’re an Elf girl?

Oh, I love it. It makes me smile. Makes me cry.

Yeah.

When they’re singing that duet together, oh.

Oh, in the shower? Yeah.

Yes. There’s so much to love about that movie.

Listen, every time I go up an escalator, I got to do the Elf.

[laughs] Do you?

[laughs] Every time. Everybody that’s with me is like, “Dude. That’s so old.” I’m like, “I got to try it. I got to see how many steps I can get.”

But it’s so wonderful. I think what really hits home about that movie is that he has those fresh eyes. And there’s always something so wonderful about somebody who can see things for the first time.

Exactly.

And it reminds you how wonderful our world really is when you can see somebody really enjoying and learning about it for the first time.

Right. Right. And it’s important. It’s important to remind us of that. And slow down. That’s what the holidays are about, is slowing down and appreciating what you have and who you have and where you are, and not trying to get more things, but appreciate what you do have. And I echo your sentiment. I think it’s very important.

And what are you most looking forward to this holiday season? I know you like putting up the tree. What else?

Rest.

Rest. Oh, that’s always a good one.

Rest, rest, and I got a new amp. Well, actually, I got a vintage amp from 1968. It’s currently being worked on now. And I’ll go plug my guitar in, and I’m going to spend a lot of time with that.

Oh, nice. You play guitar too? Like I said, ridiculously talented.

Well, thanks. Thank you. Thank you. My neighbors may say something else.

What do you normally do with your guitar? Do you play for people — friends and family?

I have. I have. But starting to record and going to put an album out here shortly.

Oh, nice.

Yeah. Just scratching an itch that I’ve had forever but never really nourished. And it’s something that I’ve always wanted to do continuously and never really took the time to take it as seriously as I should.

And then, finally, I did about a year and a half ago and realized this could’ve been a different trajectory had I taken it seriously earlier. But I’m a lot better than I thought I would be, and I pick it up a lot faster.

But it’s just calming too. It’s just the sounds and creating something from nothing. The instrument itself is so old, but there’s always something new to learn and to do with it.

What’s your genre of music? What are you writing?

Blues rock.

Nice.

Like Hendrix, Prince, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Deep Purple. That kind of thing.

Ah, very nice. And you’re putting this together now, this album you’re going to do? Are you going to sing as well?

Of course. Of course.

Wow. How exciting.

Of course. Of course. Yeah. Yeah, I might do something over at Hallmark with it.

What’s your timetable? Oh, you could do an original song in a movie?

No, like a movie about that.

Oh, nice. Even better.

Finding your love and finding it in music. I know Hallmark has done it before, but they’ve never done it with a Black guy. [laughs]

[laughs] You got that ace in the hole. And when will you have a record out so that they can see what you can do?

Soon, actually. I actually just wrote a few songs while I was here. So I’ll go back and record them. Well, actually, I’ve got to find people to accompany them with me. And then I need a few other things. Need some keys. One of them has a trumpet. So I got to find a player for that, somebody that I think can pull it off. It’ll be out. I’ll make sure I tag you guys when they come out.

So the one thing that was missing then from Heritage Holiday is your musical showcase.

No, I actually play the guitar in the movie.

You do? When?

I do. There’s a little spoiler. It’s a campfire thing, and I’m strumming on the guitar.

I just watched it, but I don’t remember seeing it. Of course, I was double-tasking, writing questions at the same time.

Ah, I see. I see. Yeah, when we’re all sitting by the fire. I forget the song. Actually, I didn’t even know it. I had to learn it on the day. But it’s a classic Christmas song, but I didn’t know the words to it.

I’ll have to keep an eye out for that, then.

Yeah. It’s just an acoustic thing. It’s a quick, acoustic thing. If you blink, you miss it. But it was there.

Well, apparently, I blinked. I blinked, Brooks. I apologize for blinking.

That’s my actual guitar. I have it on set with me all the time. It’s here with me today. And I played it in that movie.

Oh, nice. And what are you doing next? Outside of writing your script for a musical for Hallmark, writing an album. What else are you doing?

I have a graphic novel that I just bought the rights to.

Oh, for God’s sake. Are you kidding?

No. No. No. It’s like the Black Mad Max.

Oh my gosh.

A little bit different from Hallmark. But that is going to be the thing. That’s going to be fun. I’m a big George Miller fan. So that’s what I’ve been toiling on for the last, I’d say, four or five months, is this album and that.

I hear they’re calling you to set. Have a Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas.

Holiday Heritage premieres tonight at 8/7c on Hallmark Channel.

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Carissa Pavlica is the managing editor and a staff writer and critic for TV Fanatic. She’s a member of the Critic’s Choice Association, enjoys mentoring writers, conversing with cats, and passionately discussing the nuances of television and film with anyone who will listen. Follow her on Twitter and email her here at TV Fanatic.

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