Christmas is the most magical time of year so why not add a genie to the mix?
Curtis is no stranger to iconic holiday ensembles, be it a papier-mache lobster or a hideous reindeer jumper.
He hopesGeniehas the same sartorial effect.
Marc Maron and Melissa McCarthy in ‘Genie’.Universal Pictures
I gave it twice to a girlfriend who wasn’t quite a girlfriend.
So, I’ve always thought that a big old Christmas coat was a gorgeous thing.
I do love Christmas costumes.
Paapa Kwaakye Essiedu and Melissa McCarthy in ‘Genie’.Universal Pictures
Bernard Bottle (Paapa Essiedu) accidentally summons Flora while in the midst of a crisis.
Watch the trailer below and read on for more from Curtis.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Christmas is often a key setting in your films.
Melissa McCarthy in ‘Genie’.Universal Pictures
What makes it such a rich space for you to work in?
RICHARD CURTIS:I’ve been thinking about it more and more.
Christmas has always been very happy for me, and I like it as a deadline.
It’s the clearest deadline in the year.
It was a month into writingLove Actually that I decided it should be set at Christmas.
I thought, “What can force people into thinking they’ve got to get stuff done?”
InGenie, it’s like a ticking clock.
And then there are all sorts of tropes that it’s possible for you to take advantage of.
It’s the most famous week of the year with the most things connected to it.
Speaking of tropes, Christmas spirits changing people’s lives are a popular notion.
Where did you get the idea of a genie being this force that comes into this man’s life?
The film is based on a shorter, very different film that I made 20 years ago.
It’s the most fun time of year for someone to be miserable.
It’s the most fun time of year for someone to help someone stop being miserable.
He only works that one night a year.
If I wanted magic at Christmas, a genie was a fun, new way of doing it.
WasA Christmas Carolin the back of your mind at all when conceiving of it?
I don’t know about that.
Strangely, my very first encounter with entertainment was playing Tiny Tim in a production in the Philippines.
There’s got to be a bit ofChristmas Carolin everyone.
But I didn’t specifically refer to it in my head as I was writing this.
Do you ever write with actors in mind?
Melissa McCarthy has this very specific energy as a comedian and a performer.
Was that something that came after or with the script?
We went through every scene and said, “What might you do here?
What could you say here?”
Is that where the energy of this genie being a bit chaotic came from?
Or was that always in the story?
So there was always a bit of chaos, but Melissa added to that element in it.
Most of your films are set in London or England more broadly.
Why’d you choose New York this time?
I do think New York is such a magical city and particularly magical around Christmas.
But I’ve watched lots of other films at Christmas there.
It’s such a luxury to have Rockefeller Center and all the things that you connect with Christmas.
And it’s fun for me to set something somewhere new.
Melissa has some really incredible outfits, including in some of these first-look photos we’re debuting.
Her big central purple coat is such a great extrapolation.
She has this Scottish background she’s meant to have come from 300 BC or something in Scotland.
In another image where wearing a tinsel Christmas outfit with a star (above).
What might be going on there?
So, she has a hefty meal of sanitizer, which comes up in the trailer.
She thinks it’s zesty; she eats as much of it as she can.
She has no idea what a thong is but assumes that it’s some kind of Frisbee.
In the decorations, we put a Christmas tree and she extrapolates that it could be a costume.
It’s part of a joyful in-store montage.
She only wears it for about 11 seconds.
The genie is, as you said, this fish out of water.
She’s quite literally out of time having been locked away for centuries.
What fascinates you so much about playing with time and space and memory?
I’m fundamentally a pretty realistic writer in a way.
But I do love it when there can be a trick.
I love the magic of being able to make up a whole comedy world.
It’s somewhere in my bones.
Since you loveElfso much, was that an inspiration for any of these New York at Christmas locations?
I tried not to think about it or watch it.
The official answer is, definitely no.
But who knows how much it’s wormed its way into my brain.
Do you see your films as existing in the same world?
Might we hear"Christmas Is All Around"inGenie?
I don’t want somebody else’s sloppy seconds."
Geniedebuts Nov. 22 on Peacock.
Want more movie news?
