TV Talk: Pittsburgh-set Hallmark movie depicts local Alzheimer’s walk, namechecks local landmarks
Natalie (Ashley Williams) relocates to Pittsburgh in Hallmark Channel's Pittsburgh-set "Falling Together" (8 p.m. Saturday, World Alzheimer's Day), which features Natalie falling for her apartment building's standoffish superintendent (Paul Campbell, "Battlestar Galactica") and volunteering with the annual Walk to End Alzheimer's.
One of the film's executive producers, Neal Dodson, pushed for all the city skyline stock footage and Pittsburgh references scattered throughout the movie, from Natalie's job at Carnegie Mellon University (Dodson graduated from CMU in 2000 with a degree in acting) to a Warhol Museum shout-out, Mister Rogers reference and a restaurant based on a one-time Squirrel Hill landmark.
In a phone interview Wednesday, Dodson, who is married to Williams, said the two came up with the idea for the film after they moved into a New York apartment and Ashley invited the whole building to a chili party – putting flyers in the elevator, in the lobby – and no one came, a scene that also plays out with Natalie after she moves to Pittsburgh's Steeltown Lofts in "Falling Together."
"Ashely started crying, I called up the two people in the building we did know and asked them to come save this disaster, and we ended up eating chili for months," Dodson recalled.
Williams and Dodson shared that experience with a Hallmark executive who liked the idea of inviting neighbors for chili as a jumping off point in a fall-themed movie.
"But that's just a scene," Dodson said. "Then we had to figure out what the movie was."
Working with writer friend Adam Kulbersh, the trio came up with the film's plot, including the Walk to End Alzheimer's, inspired by Williams' loss of her mother to the disease in 2016. (A photo of Ashley's mother, Linda Payne Williams, hangs on the wall in the film's Alzheimer's office, which was decorated to resemble the offices of the Pittsburgh chapter's office.)
Even though they knew the film was likely to shoot in Vancouver due to the exchange rate and financial incentives, which it did in April and May, the trio picked the Pittsburgh setting to distinguish it from Hallmark's frequent small-town backdrops.
Pittsburgh references include Natalie's CMU shirt and hat ("That required seven layers of (CMU) approval," Dodson said) to a craft fair full of booths named after local neighborhoods (Point Breeze Candles, Brookline Vintage Furniture, Squirrel Hill Previously Enjoyed Books).
Dodson had Pittsburgh's Cork Factory in mind when he came up with Natalie's apartment building, Steeltown Lofts (smokestacks were added in post-production visual effects to give the building a Cork Factory vibe).
Dodson, a York, Pa., native, filmed the 2014 Starz moviemaking competition series "The Chair" in Pittsburgh. That show was produced by Before the Door, the company Dodson founded with actor Zachary Quinto and fellow CMU grad Corey Moosa. The three remain friends but went their separate ways professionally about nine years ago with Quinto operating a new version of Before the Door.
The "Falling Together" creative team in Vancouver researched Pittsburgh and on every location scout Dodson would offer, "This looks like Pittsburgh, this does not."
Kulbersh invented a diner famous for its pies, which made Dodson think of the shuttered Gullifty's in Squirrel Hill. When he was a student at CMU, he'd always encourage his parents to take him and his friends there for dinner.
"There was this epic, rotating glass dessert case that had all these pies," Dodson recalled.
Dodson acknowledged the diner's exterior in "Falling Together" more closely resembles Ritter's (it was actually filmed in the same diner set used for The CW's "Riverdale") but he was determined to get permission to use the Gullifty's name. The restaurant's name came from X the Owl on "Mister Roger's Neighborhood," who often said, "Nifty galifty" (Rogers' spelling).
"People ask what a producer does and I've got to do these weird detective hunts, spending 12 hours trying to figure out what happened to Gullifty's and who now has the rights to the name," Dodson said.
Dodson cold-called the remaining Gullifty's in Bryn Mawr, Pa., and got permission to use the name. In the best bit of Pittsburgh specificity in the film, artisans recreated the "Gulliftys: a unique eatery" sign in the same font that adorned the restaurant at 1922 Murray Ave. Dodson's only disappointment: They couldn't find space inside the diner for that rotating pie display case.
Pittsburgh Walk to End Alzheimer's manager, Lynzy Groves said the local chapter is excited to see the Pittsburgh Walk portrayed on screen. She hopes it will encourage area residents to join the upcoming Walk at Highmark Stadium, Station Square, on Oct. 19. (To register, visit act.alz.org/pittsburgh.)
Dodson said "Falling Together" was originally titled "Autumn's Gift" with the lead character named Autumn, but when another Hallmark film used "Autumn" that way, "Falling Together" producers changed the lead character to Natalie and staged a contest on set to come up with a new title. The winning entrant would get a gift certificate for dinner. Submissions ranged from the purposefully absurd ("Autumn Leaves and then Comes Back") to the ultimate winner, suggested by actor Jake Guy, who plays an allergy-bedeviled resident of Steeltown Lofts.
"He won and said, 'Whatever you were going to spend on dinner, donate it to (Walk to End) Alzheimer's,'" Dodson recalled. "Ashley burst into tears and everybody was thrilled. It was that kind of movie."
Dodson and Williams continue to work with Hallmark. She's filming a dating show, "Small Town Setup," for Hallmark+, and they have 15 possible future Hallmark movies in the pipeline.
Dodson also works outside of Hallmark, including producing big-budget action-adventure films for director J.C. Chandor, like the 2019 Ben Affleck-starring "Triple Frontier" for Netflix.
Dodson and Chandor are working on a Pittsburgh-set movie for Amazon, "The Robber," based on a German film of the same name about a marathon-running bank robber. Dodson hopes to film it in Pittsburgh.
"Eighty percent of it is set in Pittsburgh," Dodson said. "We're hoping to shoot it next year."
'SNL' season 50 begins
Jean Smart hosts the Sept. 28 season premiere of NBC's "Saturday Night Live" (11:30 p.m., WPXI-TV) with musical guest Jelly Roll.
Nate Bargatze hosts Oct. 5 with Coldplay. Ariana Grande hosts Oct. 12 with Stevie Nicks.
Pittsburgh native Michael Keaton hosts for a fourth time Oct. 19 with Billie Eilish and John Mulaney hosts Nov. 2 with Chappell Roan.
"SNL" will celebrate turning 50 with a live prime-time special Feb. 16.
