Queen Amber and King Richard have already been through more than one bump in the road to their happily ever after, so we’d expect nothing less from the Netflix holiday franchise’s third installment, “A Christmas Prince: The Royal Baby,” than to throw at least a few more (baby) bumps in the Aldovian royals’ way.
But when all is said and done at the end of “A Christmas Prince 3,” stars Rose McIver and Ben Lamb — who have played Amber and Richard, respectively, since the first film debuted in 2017 — already have their pitch for “A Christmas Prince 4” ready to go. And this idea might actually help Amber and Richard deal with all the royal drama the couple has been through over the trio of movies.
“I think ‘The Royal Couple’s Counseling’ would be a good installment for next year,” McIver told TheWrap. “Now that they’re dealing with real life, real married life, I think that would be quite funny. I mean, they’d get through, obviously.”
“Obviously!” Lamb added.
And one of the things Amber and Richard might have to discuss during their couple’s therapy sessions is the trauma they go through in the days before their first child is born in the third movie, which launches today on Netflix.
In “A Christmas Prince: The Royal Baby,” Amber and Richard are hosting King Tai (Kevin Shen) and Queen Ming (Momo Yeung) of Penglia to renew a 600-year-old sacred truce between Penglia and Aldovia just before Christmas. But when the priceless treaty goes missing, peace is jeopardized and an ancient curse looms that could affect Amber and Richard’s unborn child.
So, of course, Amber has to figure out who the thief is before the clock strikes midnight on Christmas Eve — or else.
“It was a bit of a crazy idea, but even if there is a bit of truth to this curse, it makes sense that she would get really invested in the potential threat to the health of her child,” McIver said. “So the curse and treaty and that historical element of the tradition, I actually got on board with that pretty quickly.”
Lamb says: “It adds a bit of jeopardy to the baby story, otherwise it would just be potentially, fully politically oriented. It’s their first child and they’ve gotta make sure they get it right. And I think they’re in an unknown situation with that curse that mirrors their fears about having a baby.”
That kid might have to go to therapy too if this whole curse thing doesn’t get cleared up.
“A Christmas Prince: The Royal Baby” launches Thursday on Netflix.