Richard Harmon On His Unlikely Pairing with Hallmark Channel for "Game, Set, Love"

"My friends were like, 'What's the movie you're doing? A Hallmark movie? You can't get bloody, and you can't be murdering anyone!' It was fun to tell them, 'I'll be falling in love and playing tennis.' It's so refreshing and sort of out of my normal wheelhouse. Plus, I got to work with my sister Jessica (Harmon), who directed the film. Richard Harmon likes love, and he believes in love. Why can't he fall in love in a movie?"

Harmon revealed his sister was attached to the project before he joined, and that "she did me a solid throwing me a job." But it's not the first time the siblings have collaborated. "Jessica did direct one of the final episodes of The 100," he shared. "But that was very different than this. I'd played that character for seven seasons, so I really got the final say on how he was played, and she knew that. She got to just do her directing [while] I did my work. With this movie, she let me play and have fun, which is all I can ask of any director, but she was able to rein me in when I needed to be. It was a real pleasure to work with her. She's a great director, and I'd work with her again in a heartbeat."

In the film, Harmon portrays William Campbell, a down-on-his-luck tennis pro who's on-court antics have earned him the reputation of a tennis bad boy. To revamp his career, he teams with Ashley Wong (Jennifer Khoe) to play doubles and under the guidance of former pro-turned-tennis-coach Taylor Morrison (Davida Williams, pictured at top with Harmon) hopes to secure a much-needed win. However, when Ashley is unexpectedly sidelined, Taylor is faced with a tough choice -- accept the offer to reenter the pro-tennis world she had long given up on (and work with someone she really doesn't like) or play to win.

The reason Harmon found himself needing to be reined in was that fine line between playing "the bad boy" and making the character too unlikeable. "That is a tricky line to walk," he reflected. "But for much of my career over the last 21 years, how I pay my mortgage is playing that. A big thing that helped was having my sister there. There were moments where I, maybe, made William a little too unlikable. That's when she'd say, 'Bring it in a little bit.' He's a bit like a child in a way. He lost any relationship with his parents, so this inner child, which I hope makes him likeable, is really calling out for help and is part of the cockiness and the bravado that he has."

Still, getting to act out some bad boy moments on the court for a few flashback scenes provided some levity for the versatile actor. "Those were fun," he laughed. "I just said, 'Roll the camera.' None of that was scripted and I can guarantee there was a good seven minutes more worth of stuff that didn't make it -- partly because some of it definitely wouldn't be allowed."

The only scare Harmon endured filming the movie was making his tennis skills look believable, especially with tennis legend Venus Williams serving as an executive producer. "I definitely had to put in some training," he recalled. "I was never much of a tennis player and knowing Venus was my boss, and she'd see this, made me really nervous. I didn't want to look bad and ruin the art form she's spent her entire life mastering. But they had a lot of people helping. I've actually picked up tennis since we stopped shooting and found a real love for the game."

He also found a friend in his co-star, as they bonded over their shared love of horror movies. "Davida was an absolute pleasure to work with," he shared. "She is a fantastic actor and we've become friends. We're making this beautiful romantic comedy yet talking about slasher movies between scenes. [That] really helped us when it came to playing tennis."

Having had a taste of Hallmark, Harmon is eager for more. "I like doing things I'm not used to," he admitted. "This was a great challenge and one I was really happy to have the opportunity to accept." Now he'd like to combine his love of scary movies with Hallmark for something completely different. "I'd absolutely come back for Christmas," he smiled. "Or maybe a Halloween-themed romantic comedy -- I'm there!"

Next for Harmon is a new horror movie debuting on Netflix called Margaux: Welcome Home and he has high hopes of some (nice) recognition from Hallmarkies on the street. "All I usually get is, 'Oh I hated you in that'," he laughed in closing. "That means I did my job, but I would like it if someone said, 'That Hallmark movie was so cute!' It would make me very happy."

Game, Set, Love will be telecast Saturday, August 27 at 8 p.m. on Hallmark Channel as part of their annual Fall into Love programming event.

Click the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleagues.

The opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author and/or subject(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillage.com/MyersBizNet, Inc. management or associated writers.