Written By: Michael D. McClellan |
If Liliana Tandon’s name has a familiar ring to it, maybe you’re one of the nearly 2 million viewers who’ve watched her comedic web series, Period Piece, the smartly-written, hilarious sendup that explores women in different periods of history…wait for it…having their periods. The award-winning series serves notice that the New York-based actor is not only brimming with talent, but that she also has her finger firmly on the pulse of today’s cultural zeitgeist, an artist so plugged in that her impersonations share the same rarefied air as those of Kate McKinnon and Melissa McCarthy (more on that later). Tandon’s clever parodies, each less than three minutes long and made on a shoestring budget, are the perfect bite-sized morsels for a socially-connected world in which everyone seems to suffer from attention deficit disorder. The episodes mirror their maker – intelligent, irreverent, and downright funny. They’re also rocket fuel for Tandon’s acting career, the trajectory of which already promises great things. As if that weren’t enough, the comedic powerhouse also boasts some serious acting chops: In 2016, she acted opposite Mira Sorvino and LisaGay Hamilton in the crime drama Indiscretion. On November 8, 2020, the Stella Adler grad stars in her first feature film, UPtv’s romantic comedy, A Ring for Christmas. Headlined with such big-name talent as Michael Gross (Family Ties), and the Academy Award-nominated Lorraine Bracco (Goodfellas, The Sopranos), Tandon plays a spoiled rich girl who gets cut off 25 days before Christmas. When her character, Angie Moore, discovers the existence of a sizeable trust fund she will inherit once she gets married, it jumpstarts an ill-fated hubby-search with a feel-good twist.
“My character wants to get married for all of the wrong reasons,” Tandon says with a laugh. “She’s motivated by the trust fund inheritance and not searching for true love, and she’s determined to pull it off before Christmas. It’s what she doesn’t see coming that changes everything.”
Without question, COVID-19 has also changed everything. While the world continues to struggle against the pandemic, Tandon sees A Ring for Christmas as a much-needed escape from the harsh realities of battling this virus.
“I’m very excited about A Ring for Christmas,” Tandon says. “As horrible as this year has been due to coronavirus, I think 2020 is the perfect year for this movie to come out. I think that people are really craving the holidays. People want cheer, joy, and festiveness. They want to be around their families – and even if they can’t, they still want to feel the coziness as if they were. A Ring for Christmas gives them a little bit of that coziness. The holidays can’t come fast enough this year.”
That A Ring for Christmas is even being released qualifies as a minor miracle.
attach a sign for the fictitious pub McMillen’s on State Street. Photo Courtesy Bryan Eaton
“It was filmed during the 2019 holiday season, so all of the post-production work could still be completed, despite the pandemic,” Tandon says. “Laura Boersma and John Stewart Muller at Granfalloon Productions were simply amazing in that regard. They also introduced us to Michael Lurie, Jeffrey Giles, and Alex Coscas at StoryWorks, who are the producers behind the film. I was lucky, because I was allowed to do some editing with the team in Chicago. I had never been in a studio that size, or with that many big screens. It was really fun to get a peek at all of the post-production stuff, which wouldn’t have been possible if we hadn’t finished filming when we did. Thankfully it all came together. We’re finally able to share this movie with audiences who can certainly use a warm, funny distraction from everything going on right now.”
Photo Courtesy UPtv
Tandon is the creative engine behind this holiday gem, and in more ways than one. She not only stars in A Ring for Christmas, she developed the concept and wrote the script.
“The executive team was so generous with me. They knew that I was the writer and the star, and they knew that this project was my little baby. They allowed me to have an unofficial producer role, which is very rare for a writer to have. They were very open to that. They were okay with me having input into the casting. I’m very thankful that they allowed me to have a seat at the table.”
Liliana Tandon’s love of acting goes back to her childhood, sparked during an eight-week summer camp at Brown Ledge in Vermont. Brown Ledge isn’t exclusively a theatre camp, but theatre is a big part of the program. At the time, she could have cared less. A 10-year-old Liliana Tandon was far more interested in horseback riding than learning lines.
“I was obsessed with horses at the time, but my oldest sister, Xandra, auditioned for a play. Being the youngest child of three, I said, ‘I want to do that. I want to copy my sister.’ So I auditioned for a play and discovered how much I loved it.”
To say the acting bug bit Tandon harder than the mosquitos on Lake Champlain would be an understatement. She fell in love with the stage, opening up a world full of new and exciting possibilities.
Photo Courtesy Liliana Tandon
“The theatre department at Brown Ledge was unbelievable,” she says. “The camp was eight weeks long, and during that time we would do three one-act plays a week. You would get cast on Sunday, and then you would perform on Saturday night. Not only were we doing a short play every week, we were given two weeks to put together a full-length play, and two weeks to do a musical.”
A young Liliana Tandon was struck by the discipline and focus needed to pull off so much in so little time, attributes that serve her well today.
“Talk about an amazing learning experience,” Tandon continues. “That camp taught us how to build character and learn lines really fast. We were also involved in all aspects of the productions as campers, so it was truly a unique experience. During the day we got to help build the sets, and then we rehearsed during the afternoon and evening time. It was a great place to get my start in acting.”
Now, about Period Piece.
Liliana Tandon’s whip-smart web series has not only garnered plenty of attention – the first season had over one million views on YouTube, and was featured in Cosmopolitan, Seventeen, Women’s Health, Marie Claire France, and India Today – it has also been a critical success, winning Best Original Web Series in Elizabeth Banks’ 2016 WhoHaHa Female Comedy Awards. The episodes are funny from the jump, binge-worthy skits that not only pack a punch, but also aim to destigmatize menstruation in the media as well as empower women to embrace their periods. Whether the “period” is Victorian England or 1920’s Brooklyn, you can rest assured that the comedy is, pardon the pun, bloody funny.
Photo Courtesy Liliana Tandon
“I was sitting on my friend Rachel Kent’s couch,” Tandon says, when asked about the moment that led to the series becoming reality. “She actually has a role in A Ring for Christmas. The two of us were sitting there, drinking wine, and just started laughing about the pun, ‘period piece.’ We were like, ‘That’s just funny when you think about it in those terms.’ We joked about writing a show about it, and then I woke up the next day and said, ‘Actually, I think that that’s a really good idea.’ This was right before the Me Too movement, and women were at the forefront of a lot of the social conversation. It was the perfect time to run with the idea.”
Tandon’s web series is especially brave considering the subject matter: Do it right, and you have an iconic moment on par with Melissa McCarthy’s Brides Maids character Megan, who memorably has diarrhea in a sink (not many Oscar-nominated performances can claim that); mishandle it, and you’re left picking up the pieces. Tandon not only nailed it, she partnered with Racket, a charity that provides free feminine hygiene products to women in need.
“It was so fun to write, and even better that we could help destigmatize something that every girl should be comfortable talking about, laughing at, and owning,” Tandon says. “Each episode is its own historical time period. I had to do my research. I took facts that I learned, as well as myths surrounding menstruation at time, and then exaggerated everything for comedic effect.”
Photo Courtesy Liliana Tandon
Which brings us back to Kate McKinnon and Melissa McCarthy.
Period Piece was not only a 2016 Official Selection by both the Bushwick Film Festival and ITV Fest, it showed up and showed out in Banks’ female-driven comedy awards event: Two episodes were WhoHaHa finalists for Favorite Parody (against an Amy Schumer sketch), with Tandon herself a finalist for Best Impersonation for her impression of Donald Trump – against fellow finalists McCarthy and McKinnon.
“The Trump episode, I wrote that before the 2016 election, before he became president,” Tandon says. “We just thought that it would be fun to do something that was in the news today. At first I was looking for a man to play Trump, and I was going to play the Megyn Kelly character in the sketch. I had some great options, but my friend wanted to know why I wasn’t playing Trump. So, I thought, ‘Okay, this could be kind of fun.’ And it would definitely raise the ridiculousness of it.
“It was a very proud moment when Period Piece won for Best Original Web Series. And just having my impersonation going up against Melissa McCarthy and Kate McKinnon, who were nominated for the impressions that they were doing for Saturday Night Live at the time, was a pinch-me moment. I didn’t win – I think Melissa McCarthy won – but just being nominated with them was a thrill.”
A Ring for Christmas promises to keep Liliana Tandon on everyone’s wish list. That the Indian-American actor brings intelligence, humor, and beauty to the screen is certain to endear her to audiences everywhere, as well as for Christmases to come. That she gets to do so under the direction of highly-regarded industry veteran Don E. FauntLeRoy, best known for Jeepers Creepers and several Steven Seagal films, only makes it better.
“Don was very kind, and very generous with me. He sat down with me before we shot, and we went through the whole script. Since I was also the writer, he wanted to know if there was anything he should know when it came to picturing these characters, or how I imagined certain scenes would go. That way he could make sure that he was upholding my vision for this film.
“He and his wife have both been in the industry for a very long time. With me being the less-experienced person on the set, I expected them to come in and say, ‘Great, thank you, we’ve got this.’ But Don was so considerate. It taught me that a film is a collaborative effort. The best approach is to start from a place of ego-free collaboration. From there you can come together and talk about the movie and figure it out. The fact that Don has so many amazing credits, it was very generous of him to allow me to be involved in that way.
In addition to a quality director, the cast also packs plenty of star power.
Bracco has been nominated for an Academy Award, four Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and three Screen Actors Guild Awards during her illustrious career. Gross, who graduated with an MFA from Yale, has performed steadily since 1975. He was white hot during the 1980s, playing opposite Michael J. Fox and Meredith Baxter-Birney in the hit TV series, Family Ties.
Photo Courtesy StoryWorks
“It was such an honor to work with them both,” Tandon says quickly. “With Lorraine, I hope that people enjoy watching her, because it is very, very different from what she normally does. People know her from Goodfellas and the Sopranos, so they know her as this very tough woman. The way the part is written and the way she plays it, you still see that great toughness, which I think is perfect for this character. But it is a different type of role for her, so it was exciting to see her work.”
Tandon couldn’t have been happier with Bracco’s ‘whatever-it-takes’ attitude.
“Lorraine really helped establish that this was a team effort, and that she was a part of the team. We filmed in Newburyport, Massachusetts, in 2019. One day it was 12 degrees outside, before wind chill. When you’re the lone Academy Award nominee on the set, it would have been very easy for her to say, ‘Great, call me right before you say ‘action,’ and I’ll come out and say my lines and then go right back in where it’s warm. But she was out there, with the crew, setting such a good example for everybody, and creating such an all for one, and one for all vibe. I just love that about her. She was just such a trooper. Her work ethic is incredible.”
Tandon was equally impressed with Gross, who plays Margaret Moore’s husband, Graham.
“He is just as nice as you might imagine,” she says, smiling. “Like Lorraine, he was a great part of the team. The scenes that we had together were special because he was right there with me, giving me so much to work with. I felt so incredibly lucky.
Photo Courtesy Liliana Tandon
“There’s story about Michael Gross that always warms my heart. After we finished our scenes together, he asked me if we could get a picture together. It made me feel so great, because I didn’t have to ask him, he beat me to the punch. It made me feel that he was genuinely happy and excited to be there. He understood that I might be a little nervous asking for the picture, so he took it upon himself to take that burden off of me. I’m sure he could tell that I wanted one [laughs].”
A Ring for Christmas also stars South African hunk Dean Geyer as Gabe Hudson. Geyer, best-known for his role as Brody Weston on Glee, and for his strong martial arts background, is perfectly cast as Angie Moore’s love interest.
Photo Courtesy UPtv
“Dean was really great to work with,” Tandon says. “He came out a couple of days early, so that we could have a chance to meet each other, and try to bond a little bit. Obviously, when you’re playing romantic opposites in a film, it’s always nice to develop a comfort level before the big kiss scene. You have to get to know people a little bit. So it was nice of him to come out early. He and Charles Hittinger, who plays Tyler Davis in the film, have something of a love triangle with me in the film. It was a lot of fun on the set, especially whenever they got together.”
With her magnetic screen presence, it’s easy to overlook the fact that A Ring for Christmas is Liliana Tandon’s screenplay. The multihyphenate is multitalented, and nowhere is that better illustrated than in the script. Tandon, a superb writer, took her time crafting this fun holiday romp. She also made a conscious decision not to overthink the process. The result is a feel-good movie with great character acting and a wonderful, well-paced storyline.
“For me, it was about finding something that I’d enjoy for my first film,” she says. “I didn’t want it to be too complicated to write. With these types of movies, they are similar in that they have the same kinds of arcs built into them. Then I started brainstorming, and I thought it would be funny watching a girl rushing to get married before Christmas. I couldn’t believe that there wasn’t already a Christmas movie called, A Ring for Christmas. I jumped on it.”
The fact that Tandon reached out to others for help also shows great instincts.
“I started writing it, and it took me somewhere between nine months and a year to complete. Laura Boersma at Granfalloon has been a mentor of mine for years. I’d worked for her as a production assistant, and then as an actress, and now for the first time as the creative force behind a project. She’s the one who introduced us to StoryWorks – Jeffrey, Michael, and Alex – and they’ve made a ton of these, so this genre is really their bread and butter. Laura knew that we’d be in great hands with them, and that they would know what to do. It truly does take a village to put something like this together. I’m excited for audiences to see it.”
As winter sets in and the holiday season arrives, Liliana Tandon’s career is just heating up. A graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, Tandon is excited about A Ring for Christmas and equally enthusiastic about what the future holds. She also has a passion for cooking, which should come in handy when (socially) gathered with her fiancée, Jon, to celebrate film’s premiere on UPtv on November 8.
“I love the communal, familial aspect of cooking,” Tandon says. “Hosting dinner parties and having friends over, because those are the ways you make memories. To be able to prepare a meal and watch this film will be a fun way to spend an evening.”
Liliana Tandon is a baller.
Whether she’s being nominated with the likes of Kate McKinnon and Melissa McCarthy, scoring millions of YouTube visits, or acting opposite Mira Sorvino and LisaGay Hamilton, it’s clear that Tandon has both the ambition and the intellect to make a name for herself in Hollywood. That the Stella Adler grad is on the ready to share her secret sauce – her acting joie de vivre – with other creatives, well, that makes it all the better. “My biggest piece of advice would be this,” Tandon says. “If you’re feeling stuck or overwhelmed by this industry, I would say to lean into whatever it is that’s in your way. If you say, ‘I wish I could create something but I’m not a writer,’ I would say, ‘Just try it.’ I wasn’t a writer. I didn’t go to school for writing. That wasn’t something that I was traditionally trained in. There are books you can read, you might have friends you can talk to, and the Internet is practically a limitless source of information. Definitely utilize all of those, but I strongly suggest just jumping in and trying. I’m living proof. There’s nothing like the feeling of saying, ‘Wow I had control of this from the start to the finish. I got to make this film, A Ring for Christmas, and it wouldn’t have been possible if I hadn’t jumped in with both feet.’ The same thing is true with acting. Do short films. Cast yourself. I did exactly that with Period Piece, and it worked about great for me. You never know where the risks will lead, but you will never know if you don’t try.”