Andy Gray

When you’re the only male in your household (outside of the dog), December is not always the most wonderful time of the year.

Along with the trees and the decorations and Christmas carols (not the good ones sung by The Pogues or Ramones) comes something more irritating than Whovillians to a Grinch.

I’m talking about Hallmark Christmas movies.

And it’s not just Hallmark anymore. Everyone else has seen the ratings spike that channel enjoys between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve, so love stories set during the holidays in bucolic small towns can be found on Max, Netflix, Prime and every cable channel and streaming service except ESPN, and even they have Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift this year.

Every year I see a headline about a movie that adds a new twist — the first gay Christmas rom-com, the first Christmas rom-com with a sex scene, the first Christmas rom-com set a long time ago in a galaxy far far away (that has to be the plot of one of the Disney+ spinoff series, isn’t it?).

But they’re all variations on a theme. Everyone makes jokes about it — I see them on social media — but a lot of people must be watching.

Now, I would consider myself more evolved than the average member of my gender. If my choices are a movie directed by Nora Ephron or one starring Chuck Norris, give me Nora all day every day. I like rom-coms, or at least rom-COMs, the ones that lean into the comedy half of that equation.

But if your movie stars Candace Cameron Bure, I’m gonna react with a Grrrrr (I’m assuming her last name is pronounced like the guy who killed Alexander Hamilton. If it’s not — shoot me).

The women in my household feel differently. My younger daughter, Ali, even has written a song for this time of year, sung to the tune of “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” from “Frozen”:

“Do you wanna watch a rom-com?

And watch some (women) fall in love

Well, of course you do

Why wouldn’t you

Unless you are a bum …”

It’s me. I’m the bum. —

When my wife and daughters put on one of those movies, sometimes I’ll go upstairs and read. The books so far this month include Michael Lewis’ “Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of New Tycoon” (meh), Jeff Tweedy’s “World Within a Song” (see last week’s column) and Geddy Lee’s memoir “My Effin’ Life” (only a third of the way through, but very entertaining).

Other times, I’ll stay in the living room, sitting in my blue chair with the laptop in front of me, peering over the screen and offering the occasional (OK, frequent) smart aleck remark.

On very, very, very rare occasions, I’ll start paying attention.

That happened Saturday when they were watching “Feast of the Seven Fishes,” which is currently available for streaming on Netflix, Prime and Peacock.

This isn’t as treacly as the average Hallmark fare. It’s a low-budget independent film shot in West Virginia and released in 2018, and it’s a movie that the Mahoning Valley Historical Society hosted a screening of last year.

It doesn’t have the candy-cane-colored palette of Hallmark, but it follows the same basic blueprint.

Preppy wealthy girl comes home for Christmas from her Ivy League college and meets a working-class Italian kid who dreams of going to art school instead of taking over the family’s grocery business. Can these two opposites find love and happiness together?

Essentially, it’s “My Big Fat Italian Christmas” with a bit of the food porn of “Big Night.” It’s filled with veteran character actors (Joe Pantoliano, Paul Ben-Victor, Ray Abruzzo, Lynn Cohen) who make these people feel authentic and allow the audience to feel like they’re eavesdropping on the banter and ball-breaking that goes on among family members who have a long history together.

I’m neither Italian nor Catholic, but my Christmas Eves for more than 35 years have been spent enjoying the feast of the seven fishes — well, at least six of them; I usually skip the pasta sauce with tuna — with my wife’s Italian / Irish / Catholic family.

I’m looking forward to the fish on Sunday … and the end of holiday rom-com season.

Andy Gray is the entertainment editor of Ticket. Write to him at agray@tribtoday.com.