Holiday In Handcuffs, meet Christmas With Jerks
A double lesson in the delicate art of seduction.
An imagined conversation between me and my imagined protégée.
PROTEGE: Anna Claus, how do you make a man fall in love with you?
ANNA: Have you tried whiskey?
PROTEGE: No but like, a really handsome man.
ANNA: You mean like Ryan Reynolds or Ryan Gosling?
PROTEGE: No, someone with dark hair and dimples. Like Mario Lopez. Or a guy who kind of looks like Mario Lopez.
ANNA: Do you mean Saved By The Bell Mario Lopez or that Lifetime original about Kentucky Fried Chicken Mario Lopez?
PROTEGE: Exactly in the middle. Say, 2007. Or maybe a guy who is not Mario Lopez but also has dark hair and likes to take his shirt off and be kind of oily underneath, circa now.
PROTEGE: I’d have to be beautiful and confident, right? And have some super high-powered job like a lawyer or best-selling novelist?
ANNA: No. Absolutely not.
PROTEGE: But those are always the types of women that men fall in love with!
ANNA: Usually, yes. But not Mario Lopez or Mario-Lopez-Adjacents. Oh, they’ll THINK they love a woman like that. In fact, they are engaged to a woman like that. She is raven-haired and wealthy and successful, and has the most adorable little upturned nose. But beware! It is not true love.
PROTEGE: So something a little more lowkey, like a cookie baker or veterinarian?
ANNA: No. Those are professions that require a modicum of competence. If you want to land yourself a Lopez, you need to be a mess. Like, completely fucking unhinged.
PROTEGE: Is that a profession?
ANNA: It is a way of life.
PROTEGE: Teach me, oh wise one. How do I become a mess?
ANNA: Are you blonde?
PROTEGE: I can be.
ANNA: That’s a good start. Now you have to be unable to do something as simple as put leftover Chinese food in the refrigerator. You need to be a washed-up child star who is drunk and rude on social media. You need to bomb a softball job interview and try to give yourself a perm but leave it in too long and look like a poodle. Do you like vodka?
PROTEGE: I mean, in a cocktail…
ANNA: No. NOT in a cocktail. Don’t even use a glass. Just chug it straight from the bottle.
PROTEGE: Am I allowed to be good at anything?
ANNA: You are allowed to be good at one thing. But it has to be a whimsical artsy-fartsy thing. Like…art. Or acting. Under no circumstances may you have real life skills.
PROTEGE: If I’m terrible at everything, how do I like….survive?
ANNA: That’s easy, just have rich parents. That part is really important because if you’re a poor mess you’re a scourge on society, but if you’re a rich mess it’s quirky and charming.
PROTEGE: So once I’ve mastered being a mess, how do I get him to fall in love with me?
ANNA: Threaten his personal safety.
PROTEGE: That—doesn’t seem right.
ANNA: Are you saying I don’t know how to seduce Mario Lopez?
PROTEGE: No, I mean it doesn’t seem morally right.
ANNA: Oh, well of course it’s not morally right! But trust me: it works. The more cruel, dangerous, and illegal things you do to him, the harder he’ll fall in love with you.
PROTEGE: So I should tell him to invest in Bitcoin?
ANNA: Too cerebral. You need to seriously destabilize him: make him believe his life is in jeopardy. Kidnap him at gunpoint, put laxatives in his smoothie, steal his mobility device if he has a broken limb—that kind of thing.
PROTEGE: I find it hard to believe that would make someone love me.
ANNA: Oh, he won’t at first. In fact, he’ll hate you! And he’ll tell you over and over again that you are crazy and he hates you and he just wants to get back to his successful raven-haired fiancée with whom he’s presumably spent years building a relationship.
PROTEGE: That’s when I should apologize and let him go, right?
ANNA: Au contraire—that’s when you dig in harder. The tides of love are about to turn!
PROTEGE: I don’t understand how this could possibly lead to a healthy relationship.
ANNA: Just trust me. At this point you share a bottle of red wine and say something vulnerable.
PROTEGE: And…?
ANNA: What do you mean, and? That’s it.
PROTEGE: All it takes for a dimpled smokeshow to fall out of love with his longtime girlfriend and in love with a damaged sociopath is one bottle of red wine???
ANNA: Don’t forget heartfelt conversation! But yes. Have you heard of Stockholm Syndrome?
PROTEGE: Maybe?
ANNA: Google it.
PROTEGE: Fine. So okay, now he’s in love with me. And we skip hand-in-hand to Christmastown and live happily ever after?
ANNA: Not quite. At this point you’ll almost-kiss, and have some more vulnerable conversations, and do some Christmassy shizz like bake cookies or write letters to Santa, and he’ll make an over-the-top romantic gesture like buying you jewelry or building you your own private ice rink, and then he’ll go back to his fiancée.
PROTEGE: Wait, what?? I’ve given up my successful veterinary practice to be an out-of-work actress, compromised my moral integrity and broken the law on multiple counts, and he still gets back with his fiancée?
ANNA: Well, he has to. In order to realize that what he really wants is you.
PROTEGE: You know what? Fuck this. 2007 Mario Lopez isn’t worth it.
ANNA: Sorry kiddo. I don’t make the rules.
PROTEGE: What about Will Ferrell? What if I just like…want him to give me a comforting hug?
ANNA: Oh that’s way easier. You just need to be Octavia Spencer and have the voice of an angel.
PROTEGE: SOLD.
Holiday in Handcuffs: 4 Christmas Trees
Christmas with Jerks: 5 Christmas Trees*
*I actually really loved this movie. It’s a little snarkier and quirkier than most most Christmas romcoms, the protagonist is delightfully unhinged, it embraces the radical notion that women enjoy sex, and it has a bunch of original music that acts as commentary on the action in a really clever way. I am also maybe a tiny bit biased because my friend group referred to ourselves as “the jerks” and we’d have like 12-hour jerk brunches and now we all live in different places and I miss those jerks.
My wife and I have watched Holiday in Handcuffs every year since its release. I believe we could easily stage a two person performance at our local theater.