After 16 years, The Santa Clause franchise is returning, and Tim Allen is back in the red suit. On Nov. 16, the miniseries The Santa Clauses will premiere on Disney+. The sequel series takes place after the action of the third movie, 2006’s The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause. Allen is returning as Scott Calvin/Santa Claus, Elizabeth Mitchell is returning as Carol Calvin/Mrs. Claus, and David Krumholtz will be back as fan-favorite character, Bernard the elf.
But, there are also some new additions to the cast, including Allen’s real-life daughter, Elizabeth Allen-Dick, who is playing Santa’s daughter, Sandra, in the series. In recent interviews, Allen and Allen-Dick have opened up about working on the show together, which is Allen-Dick’s debut acting role. Read on to find out more about the father and daughter turned acting partners.
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In the first movie, 1994’s The Santa Clause, Scott Calvin had just one child, Charlie (Eric Lloyd). Then, at the end of The Santa Clause 3, Calvin and Carol welcomed another son named Buddy. In the new miniseries, Buddy (Austin Kane) is now a teenager, and he’s joined by a younger sister, Sandra, who is 13.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Allen shared that he thought it’d be cool if his daughter were an extra in the miniseries, but that she ended up landing a larger part after auditioning.
“I wanted to put my youngest daughter as an elf, just so she’d see herself in a movie. But as she was reading for that, she read so well that they said, ‘We’d like to read her for more of a part,'” Allen explained. “I said, ‘Whatever you want to do. I want nothing to do with it. I don’t want to pitch my daughter for a part in the movie.’ But she ended up moving to the high ranks. They loved how she read, loved it so much, because she’s playing a 13-year-old girl and she is 13. They ended up casting her as Santa’s daughter. It was a surprise but it became the most amazing experience.”
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During an interview with Extra, Allen-Dick said of her first on-set experience, “It was just incredible. I did not feel like it was work.” She added that she was able to relate to Sandra in some ways. “My character, she’s not a lot, a lot like me, but she has some characteristics that were easier to play. It was just so much fun.”
Allen welcomed Allen-Dick in 2009 with his second wife Jane Hajduk. Allen and Hajduk have been married since 2006. The Home Improvement actor also has a 32-year-old daughter, Katherine Allen, who he welcomed with first wife Laura Deibel. Both daughters have accompanied their father to red carpet events over the years, including the Toy Story 4 premiere in 2019.