Chevy Chase and Randy Quaid’s Reunion May Not Be What ‘Christmas Vacation’ Fans Were Hoping For

For a lot of folks, it’s become tradition to spend the holiday season watching Clark Griswold celebrate with his family/suffer several traumatic brain injuries in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. It’s like a modern It’s a Wonderful Life, if George Bailey didn’t have a Guardian Angel and was constantly fantasizing about cheating on Mary. 

Christmas Vacation fans were no doubt thrilled to learn that two of the film’s most memorable (and affordable) stars were set to appear in another Christmas-themed family comedy. Chevy Chase and Randy Quaid teamed up once again for The Christmas Letter, which, as we’ve mentioned before, is about an “unemployed copywriter” who tries to compete with his wealthy friend’s “over-the-top Christmas letter.”

The film’s producer claimed that the movie is a “a fun nod to classics like Christmas Vacation.” In addition to Chase and Quaid, it also features Brian Doyle-Murray, who played Clark’s boss Mr. Shirley. 

While all of these guys are too old to play the lead character at this point in time, clearly they must still have pretty significant roles in the film, right? After all, both Chase and Quaid appear on the poster. And Chase is the top-billed star.

Yeah, not so much. Both actors only appear in supporting roles, and even that description may be exaggerating things slightly. Quaid plays a local courier, while Chase briefly shows up as the manager of a snooty French restaurant. Oh, and his name is “Norm de Plume.”

But since it would be weird to have the actors who played Clark Griswold and Cousin Eddie not share the screen together in this Christmas movie, we get a wildly unnecessary scene in which the courier tries to call the main character, Joe, about a package. Since Joe left his phone at the restaurant, Chase’s character answers. 

So it is a Christmas Vacation reunion, but it’s over FaceTime and only lasts for like 65 seconds. At least the cameras cut before Quaid got a chance to rant about Hollywood Star Whackers. 

We don’t want to beat up on this movie too much, considering that it was a low-budget indie effort — and because complaining about the quality of holiday movies is now futile in a post-Hot Frosty world — but the filmmakers didn’t have to make it seem as though the movie was going to star the guys from Christmas Vacation.

Obviously, they were going to try and use their most famous cast members to attract eyeballs, but the advertising is actively misleading. The poster flat out makes it seem like a buddy movie starring these three dudes, not a movie starring just one of those dudes who happens to accept goods and services from the other two.

Like, if you went to a coffee shop today, then made a movie about your entire month, would you put the barista on the poster?