Hallmark Announces 40 New Christmas Movies for 2020, But No LGBTQ Love Stories

To pick us up from our Coronavirus doldrums, the Hallmark Channel announced that they would be featuring 40 new Christmas movies this season. Although they have repeatedly expressed a desire to be more diverse (there were two movies featuring nonwhite characters and two “Hanukah” movies last year), fans and foes of the channel have expressed dismay that there doesn’t yet appear to be a movie featuring an LGBTQ couple in the mix.

George Zaralidis, vice president of network program publicity at Crown Media Family Networks, which owns the Hallmark Channel, addressed this issue in a statement to Yahoo Entertainment: “Yesterday we were excited to announce 18 of our 40 holiday movies. Diversity and inclusion is a top priority for us and we look forward to making some exciting programming announcements in the coming months, including announcements about projects featuring LGBTQ storylines, characters, and actors. We are committed to creating a Hallmark experience where everyone feels welcome.”

According to Yahoo, Zaralidis told NBC that the channel is in “active negotiations” to feature more LGBTQ content in its Christmas offerings and promised to “announce more details when we can.”