A little white lie leads to embarrassment, laughs and romance in OWN’s Fake Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.
The holiday movie tells the story of reserved college professor Maya (Kiki Layne), who causes a stranger (Carlisle J. Williams) to suffer a head injury during a chance meeting in the ice-covered parking lot at a grocery store.
Maya follows the man to the hospital to make sure he’s okay, and convinces his family the two are in a relationship. That one little lie takes on a life of its own, with Maya getting pulled into the family’s holiday plans.
The situation gets more complicated because of her chemistry with the man’s doctor (Etienne Maurice), who just happens to be her ex.
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In an interview with Urban Hollywood 411, Maurice joked that the story is a little crazy, but he said it’s heartwarming.
“You’re going to cringe a little bit, you’re going to wonder to yourself, why is this girl lying so much through this movie? But you’re going to see that it’s a wonderfully crafted film directed by Kelly Fyffe-Marshall,” the actor told us.
The cast also includes Claudia Hamilton, Kwaku Adu-Poku, Phelisha Cassup, Jackie Richardson, Nadine Whiteman, Roy Lewis, and Daniel Malik.
At one point in the film, a friend (Hamilton) tells Maya her life is “like a telenovela right now, so many hot men everywhere!”
Maurice joked about the storyline, “It’s a lot of exes, a lot of love, a lot of Christmas cheer.”
The actor also talked about the challenges of playing a doctor.
“I think it was the terminology, some of the words were a little bit of a tongue twister for me,” he shared.
He said he contacted his own doctors for advice.
“I was able to call them and ask them some questions with it, and ask them about the different nuances of what it means to be a doctor, especially a Black doctor,” he explained.
Maurice is the son of Emmy-winning Abbott Elementary star Sheryl Lee Ralph. The actor said he and his new wife plan to divvy up the holidays between their two families.
Asked what his mom likes to cook for Christmas, he admitted the busy actress doesn’t spend a lot of time in the kitchen.
“My mother does not cook,” he said while laughing. “No, no, I’ll take that back. She cooks on occasion during the holidays, you know she can cook a turkey, but that’s about it.”
Maybe the family will all gather around the TV and watch Fake Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.
The movie is part of the 2025 “OWN For the Holidays” programming slate and premieres Saturday, Nov. 29 at 9pm ET/PT on the cable network.
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