Some unlikely candidates have been headed to Lifetime recently. Just a few days after Will Ferrell and Kristen Wiig initially announced a secret Lifetime project, the cabler has picked up Grace of Monaco, a movie starring Nicole Kidman. That’s right, the well-known Australian actress is now headed to Lifetime, too, not that she has much say about it.
Grace of Monaco, which stars Nicole Kidman as famed actress Grace Kelly, is headed to Lifetime on May 25, otherwise known as Memorial Day. The Lifetime release is actually big news for the movie, which initially premiered at Cannes, but was widely panned by critics attending the festival (and the royal family who saw the film). One man’s panned movie is another man’s diamond in the rough, and Lifetime feels Grace of Monaco will be a perfect fit for the cabler. After all, the movie does feature a more prominent cast than most Lifetime-aired TV movies ever get. Kidman’s in the lead, and she’s surrounded by a supporting cast that includes Tim Roth as Prince Rainier III, but also Frank Langella, Parker Posey and Paz Vega.
Lifetime was not the originally intended destination of the movie, obviously. It was initially thought that the movie could be an actual Oscar contender, but then the bad buzz began rolling in. The movie was pushed back. Although The Weinstein Company secured the slot opening the Cannes Film Festival in 2014, things weren’t looking great. Much of the news related to the film prior to the festival announcement had to do with a public feud that was ongoing between Harvey Weinstein and Grace of Monaco’s director, Olivier Dahan. Following the bad press, the Cannes premiere happened and people disliked the movie, leaving it in limbo.
With all the bad press, it’s not a huge surprise that Grace of Monaco would be denied a theatrical release, but it is probably a tough blow for those involved with the movie to go from being thought of as a possible Oscar contender to cable TV pulp. Soon, Lifetime will probably recut a TV spot, but until then, you can check out the studio trailer for Grace of Monaco, below, in order to get an idea of the tone and premise of the movie, which is set several years following Grace Kelly’s entrance into royal society.
Tune in for Lifetime’s Grace of Monaco on Monday, May 25 at 8 p.m. ET.
