As fans of Alison Sweeney surely know, not only is she a Hallmark Channel star and soap opera veteran from “Days Of Our Lives,” she’s also a mom.
Hallmark viewers got to meet Sweeney’s daughter, 17-year-old Megan Sweeney, when she appeared alongside her mom in Hallmark’s “Romance at Hope Ranch” back in February.
In a recent interview with People, Sweeney looked back at the experience, and recalled one moment in particular.
A Tearful Scene
As Sweeney told the magazine, that scene was the first one that she and her daughter filmed together, in which their characters — a mother and daughter — say goodbye after the mom drops her daughter off at her college dorm room.
“I had memorized my lines,” Sweeney recalled. “But I didn’t expect [how emotional it would feel]. I mean, I knew it was an emotional scene, and then I looked at my little girl — oh, my God, in this dorm room — and I just couldn’t keep it together.”
That was confirmed by fellow Hallmark veteran Ashley Williams, who joined Sweeney during the interview. “She did cry,” Williams recalled. “I remember that scene. It’s one of those scenes that’s impossible to watch without crying.”
A Natural Pro
HallmarkIn fact, Sweeney remembered it was her daughter urging her to get her emotions in check so they could continue filming.
“[Megan] was like, ‘Mom, pull it together. We’re still acting.’ I was like, ‘Right, right, right. Got it. Got it. Okay, your turn,'” she said.
Watching her teenage daughter make her acting debut made Sweeney realize the apple had not fallen far from the proverbial tree.
“Megan’s a big personality, and she was not at all nervous about being on camera, not for a split second,” she said. “And she didn’t turn. Like there was no — you know how people, especially the first time on camera, there’s sort of like a, ‘Oh, I’m acting now.’ No. She was just like, ‘Yeah, cool. What are we doing now?’”
A Mother-Daughter ‘Heart-to-Heart’
That said, Megan had a “great time” acting in the film, but didn’t see herself doing it again.
As Sweeney related, her daughter had a “heart-to-heart” with her.
“She sat me down to say that maybe acting … like she might not wanna necessarily do it again,” Sweeney remembered.
An Emotional Moment ‘That Really Served the Movie’
Earlier this year, Sweeney spoke with EntertainmentNow about the movie, recalling how powerful that scene felt to her.
“It just felt so real, I’m kind of getting emotional even talking about it,” Sweeney said ahead of the movie’s premiere.
“It just felt like such a sincere moment between my daughter and I, and I think that really served the movie,” she continued.
“I think Megan and I kind of had a real moment,” added Sweeney. “The movie starts off with Hope dropping off her daughter at college, and we’d run our lines, we both kind of just looked at it like any scene … And when we were doing the scene, there was a moment where — and we didn’t even talk about it right then, but we kind of talked about it later — it just felt so real.”
