Hallmark Star ‘Nervous’ About Replacing Candace Cameron Bure

Hallmark star Skyler Samuels has taken over the role of Aurora Teagarden for tthe Hallmark Mystery channel reboot. But she recently revealed that stepping into Candace Cameron Bure’s shoes made her nervous.

Skyler Samuels Was Nervous About the ‘Longstanding Fan Base’

Bure starred as Aurora Teagarden for 18 mystery movies. But when she moved exclusively to Great American Family, the franchise came to a halt — at least temporarily. In March 2023, Hallmark announced that they were rebooting the “Aurora Teagarden” series, but with a younger Teagarden who was just returning to Lawrencton, EW reported. Samuels was chosen for that role.

In an interview with Us Weekly, Samuels revealed that the opportunity was a big surprise when offered to her, and she was nervous about taking on such a big role for Hallmark.

“I was excited because I love a challenge, but I also was a little nervous because I understood that there was this longstanding fan base,” she told Us Weekly. She said that some fans were excited about the prequel series, but others had more of a wait-and-see attitude about it.

When the first movie came out and she got a lot of positive feedback, she was happy about “such a win.”

Samuels didn’t want to just be “mimicking or coypcatting” Bure, she told Us Weekly, but she still wanted to honor those previous 18 movies. Because her version of Aurora was younger, doing both was a little easier.

“I wanted to have my own Aurora but one that paid homage to the Aurora that people knew and loved before,” she told Us Weekly. “And I think our director, my dear friend and work wife, Jessica Harmon, did such a great job kind of coming up with a tone that felt new and familiar at the same time. I think we’ve threaded that really nicely.”

The New Movies Will Delve Into Aurora’s ‘Juicy Backstory’ with Arthur

Since the first movie came out, Samuels has filmed two more movies at the beginning of 2024, she told Us Weekly. The movies will delve into the “juicy backstory we get to have with Arthur and Aurora,” she noted. “…The [will they], won’t they stuff.”

Peter Benson played Arthur in the original series, and Evan Roderick is portraying Arthur in the new prequel series. In an interview with ET Online in 2023, Samuels noted that the history of Aurora and Arthur’s relationship was “only ever alluded to in the original movies.”

“There were passing comments about how they had a thing when they were younger, but now they’re just friends, but we never really see that in full fruition in the original movies,” Samuels said. “Now we get to really give the audience the full juicy, deep-dive into the will they-won’t they burgeoning romantic relationship, how that came to be and watching them work together solving crimes… It’ll be a new dimension to Arthur and Aurora that the original audience will really enjoy.”

In the original series, Aurora had a relationship with Martin Bartell, portrayed by Yannick Bisson, before his character was written off and replaced by Niall Matter’s Nick. Bisson has been open about why he left the series.

He told  TV Goodness that he simply had scheduling issues he couldn’t work out, because he was also starring in “Murdoch Mysteries.” After not being able to go on a vacation for three years, something had to change.

“I would have happily kept going, but I think they wanted somebody that had more flexibility,” he said.

Matter told TV Goodness that it took some time, but fans eventually accepted him on the original series.

“Luckily for me, I’ve seen the fans really warm up to to Nick and Aurora, and for the most part, now I see nothing but people loving the two of them together,” he said.

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