Royal Romance, Chapter One Billion. But Wait.

**Spoilers. In name only.**

This movie is about a blue collar Pittsburgh mechanic who is discovered to be the forgotten heir of a dukedom in England (real country!) and is reluctantly talked into meeting the duke, his father, and possibly claiming his lands, title, and the aristocratic girl. 

Of the dozens and dozens (and more dozens, including TV romances on other channels) of royal romance movies that Hallmark has produced in recent years only two have featured a commoner guy and an aristocratic girl. It’s usually a princely type guy and a commoner girl. The only ones I could dig up were Royal Runaway Romance and Once Upon a Holiday. And those were about the princesses coming to America, The Land of Commoners, to find love with their regular guys. So this is, dare I say, a unique take? At least for Hallmark?  I can’t be the only one who finds the Low guy/High girl romance trope appealing. Why is it so rare? I will leave the question for sociologists and cinematic and literary history buffs to figure out.  But it’s interesting. In fact, the only other similar movie I can think of, of any sort other than this, is 1991’s King Ralph with John Goodman and Peter O’Toole. And even that one had the low guy ending up with the low girl.

Other than the role reversal aspect, this one followed the planogram for Hallmark royal romances to a “T”.  Hallmark institution Andrew Walker plays Johnny Payne, whose mother, a former nightclub singer married “Billy” who turned out to be a runaway royal duke. Billy’s father successfully pressured him back to England in the name of duty, and the marriage was annulled, Billy not knowing about Dottie’s pregnancy. Shades of Amanda Bynes’ What Every Girl Wants! In the present day, Duke William’s ward and loyal advisor (former regular girl Prudence) discovers the existence of Johnny and goes to America to bring him back. A good judge of character, she wants to prevent the mother of all dickheads, Alistair, from inheriting the dukedom and being mean to the servants and villagers. Johnny agrees to go in order to meet the bad dad who abandoned him and his mother and give him a piece of his mind. He ends up bonding with Prudence, all of the servants and sundry other low-borns on the estate and in the pubs, and finally Dear Old Dad, over the restoration of a Triumph GT-6. Of course, the estate is in financial hot water, as all English estates are, and he fixes that too. All the while tangling with and triumphing over Awful Alistair (and his mother). Disaster looms when Alistair sneakily finds out that Johnny’s mom had the marriage annulled before Johnny was born, thus throwing his heirship into jeopardy. 

All is settled happily in a flurry of discoveries, featuring a forged signature and old stolen letters. A first class plane ticket for Dottie, Johnny’s mom, is not far behind, as well as a delightful final reveal. Despite the utter predictability and eye-rollingly cringe moments here and there, this was a rather fun and light-hearted little diversion which I choose not to judge too harshly. I particularly enjoyed Emilie de Ravin’s Prudence, and Simon Coury as Duke William who started out sad and tired but was revitalized by meeting his long lost son. Fiach Kunz as Alistair was very hateful and Andrew Walker attractive and reliable as ever as Johnny. Actually, I did remember a similar Low guy/High girl dynamic in a Hallmark movie. Not surprisingly, it’s one of my all time favorites, Midnight Masquerade, a role-reversal modern take on Cinderella. And it may be time for another look at King Ralph.