Julie Gonzalo Is Still a Hollywood Mainstay, 18 Years After ‘Christmas With the Kranks’
Published Dec. 20 2022, 1:00 p.m. ET
If Tim Allen’s Christmas movie oeuvre is on rotation in your home, you might be wondering where Blair from Christmas With the Kranks is now.
That 2004 movie — based on the 2001 novel Skipping Christmas by John Grisham — starred Tim as Luther Krank and Jamie Lee Curtis as Nora Krank, Luther’s wife. Dan Aykroyd and M. Emmet Walsh played annoying neighbors, and Julie Gonzalo played Blair Krank, Luther and Nora’s daughter.
In the movie, Luther and Nora decide to skip their usual Christmas festivities after Blair leaves home. But when Blair makes a surprise return for the holidays, Luther and Nora have to scramble to deck the halls in time.
Critics panned Christmas With the Kranks — it has a pitiful 5 percent Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes — but the movie recently ranked as the third-most watched movie on the free streaming platform Freevee. And it’s just one of many credits on Julie’s filmography…
Julie Gonzalo, Blair from ‘Christmas With the Kranks,’ has had many TV roles.
On television, Julie played college student Parker Lee in the CW teen drama Veronica Mars, attorney Maggie Dekker on the ABC legal comedy-drama Eli Stone, lawyer Pamela Rebecca Barnes on the TNT primetime soap Dallas, and businesswoman Andrea Rojas on the CW action drama Supergirl. She also guest-starred in Grey’s Anatomy, Lucifer, and The Good Doctor recently.
On the big screen, Julie took on roles in Freaky Friday, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, A Cinderella Story, and, of course, Christmas With the Kranks.
“It’s a great comedy and it goes right along with the book, John Grisham’s novel, which [is] outstanding,” Julie said at the Christmas With the Kranks premiere in 2004. “It’s such a great message for the holidays that I think people need in their lives … neighbors being important and family being important.”
She’s in a relationship with Chris McNally, one of her Hallmark co-stars.
Julie’s boyfriend is When Calls the Heart actor Chris McNally, whom she met in 2017 as they filmed the Hallmark movie The Sweetest Heart, according to Us Weekly. In the movie, Julie plays cupcake baker Maddie. Chris plays Nate, her first love, who comes back into her life after 14 years away.
“The first day we met, it was our camera and our make-up and hair testing,” she told FanSided in 2018, recalling her first interaction with Chris. “He was busy that weekend doing a play. But I was like, if you can squeeze me in at some point, I’d love to just sit down with you, run some lines, and run some scenes …. but mostly, just get to know you, get to know each other.”
“He’s such a wonderful, wonderful person and a terrific actor, so it was very easy with him,” she added.
And in June 2022, Julie and Chris announced the birth of their child with an Instagram photo of their newborn gripping their pointer fingers. “Our hearts are full…” Julie wrote in her Instagram post. “Welcome, baby M.”
