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The Princess Switch has become a Christmas tradition for festive rom-com fans, and when the third film, Romancing the Star, debuted on Netflix last month, fans could barely contain their excitement.
While most viewers became completely enthralled in the jewel heist at the centre of the 2021 sequel, some eagle-eyed viewers spotted something rather unusual about Edward's appearance in the film and just like that a viral TikTok was born.
Watch the clip below:
Sharing a compilation of Edward's scenes from the new film, TikToker Zoe Coxon put forward her theory explaining why she thinks Edward "wasn't actually there in the third Princess Switch movie."
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The scenes show Edward (played by Sam Palladio) and Stacy (Vanessa Hudgens) standing next to each other or Edward by himself during group scenes.
And now Mike Rohl, the director of all three Princess Switch films has admitted the crew had to employ "the magic of cinema" to ensure the much-loved character could appear in the latest adventure.
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“With covid and with the challenges of production, from time to time we were challenged with the availability of people and Sam from time to time had some availability things that he had to balance," he tells Tyla. Sam was filming the ABC series Rebel in the US at the time.
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"With covid and everything like that we had to think of ways of getting him efficiently into the movie to accommodate all our schedules and the reality of the world.
"We treated him in some cases just like a fourth Vanessa," he joked. "We had to use the magic of cinema as best we could and for the most part Sam is a seamless part in the movie and a full participant and his effect on the movie are great."
In the Romancing the Star, Queen Margaret, Princess Stacy and Margaret's cousin Fiona, become entangled in a jewel heist.
The movie serves as an origin story for Fiona and her ex, Peter Maxwell (Remy Hii) also helps them retrieve the stolen relic. Mike says it was a "conscious decision" to focus on the Elizabeth Hurley-inspired character.
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Romancing the Star was filmed in Edinburgh at the start of the year when the world was in lockdown. Despite the restrictions, Mike and the crew managed to pull of another mind-blowing Netflix rom-com crossover with A Christmas Prince star Theo Devaney who plays Count Simon.
“In a weird way Covid helped because everyone was in their own bubbles everywhere so Theo, who lives in London and it was easy to get in touch with him and when everything was arranged to just get him to Edinburgh to hide out in a hotel with the rest of us."
An unintentional universe crossover that British Princess Switch fans are obsessed is former EastEnders actor Ricky Norwood who plays Reggie. Mike, who is Canadian and based in Vancouver has seen Fatboy's scenes in the BBC soap and gave his seal of approval.
"I saw a few clips of him in EastEnders and it was sort of weird for me because I was like 'hey that's Reggie', he did a great job.
"The character looks interesting and I was impressed. I could see why he’s popular!"
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One thing fans are waiting to hear about is news regarding a fourth adventure. Vanessa hinted at the possibility of a fourth film in an interview with Entertainment Tonight last month and Mike says another sequel is something he would like to do but isn't set in stone just yet.
"I don’t exactly know what Vanessa’s point of view is, she’s sort of been like ‘anything can happen. It really depends on a lot of factors’.
"I know three was originally the goal. But there’s a lot of momentum, I would be open to it, I know a lot of other people would be open to it.
"I know Vanessa's career is blossoming like crazy. I credit the success to Vanessa. She’s such an energy and a great representative for our movie she does a great job and she’s very talented.”
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While the fourth movie is not a sure thing just yet, Mike also teased a possible baby storyline and a fourth lookalike from Africa.
And it sounds like either Stacy or Margaret would be first to have babies. Mike was asked about the possibility of a fourth film: "I think most fans are probably looking at their watch thinking ‘you guys have been married for a while, tick tick tick, come one’. It does seem like if it did move forward it would be hard to resist the idea of babies coming onto the scene and the effect that would have."
But what if Fiona was the first to have a baby? "I never thought that one!" he responds excitedly.
"What if all three start having kids at the same time. It would be like The Brady Bunch or The Partridge Family. We could go a lot of places with that!
"If there was a fourth one, you could change up the story world completely. Maybe it's in Monaco or there’s another cousin in Africa.
"It’s a goldmine of ideas that could happen."
Featured Image Credit: NetflixTopics: TV And Film, Netflix, Christmas