Netflix is back with yet another rom-com. This time it is an adaptation of Katherine Center's bestselling novel The Bodyguard, and Leighton Meester and Jared Padalecki are all set to headline the holiday romance. Additionally, the film will also feature Andie MacDowell, Walker Hayes, Noah LaLonde and Toby Sandeman.
The story of the 2022 novel revolves around a "charming action star" who is assigned a "no-nonsense bodyguard" for safety over the holidays. What starts out as a professional commitment will soon turn complicated as sparks will fly between the two and secrets will unravel. With a script penned by Erin Cardillo and Richard Keith, the film will be helmed by Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum.
Meester, Padalecki and Center want a new title for the film, apart from The Bodyguard, as it reminds one of the eponymous film starring Kevin Costner and the late Whitney Houston. The three have enlisted the help of fans for suggesting a new name for the film. Sharing a video announcing the project, Padalecki wrote on Instagram, "Getting ready to head into production, and I’m incredibly excited to be teaming up with Netflix on this one. This story has so much heart, and we can’t wait to bring Katherine Center’s The Bodyguard to the screen." To hint at searching for a new name, the actor added the hashtag #NotBodyguardTheMovie.
Leighton Meester, known for her stint as Blair Waldorf across six seasons of Gossip Girl, was recently seen in an extended cameo role in her husband, Adam Brody's Netflix series, Nobody Wants This. On the film front, she was last seen in EXmas in 2023. She also had a guest role in I Love LA earlier this year.
Jared Padalecki, who rose to fame in the early 2000s after appearing on the television series Gilmore Girls, recently wrapped up filming for the fifth and final season of Prime Video's The Boys. This adaptation will mark his comeback to films after his last feature appearance in Friday the 13th in 2009.
Known for films like Careful What You Wish For and Sneakerella, Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum last collaborated with Netflix for Purple Hearts in 2022. The film, also an adaptation of the eponymous novel by Tess Wakefield, starred Sofia Carson and Nicholas Galitzine in lead roles.