The inspiring true story of Bay Area author Kristine Carlson will be the basis for a Lifetime movie starring Heather Locklear and executive produced by Meghan McCain.
As announced on Monday, Lifetime has green-lit “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: The Kristine Carlson Story” (working title). The cable TV film will recall how Carlson, co-author of the best-selling self-help book series “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff,” found her world crashing down in 2006 when her husband, Richard, died suddenly of an embolism while on a flight from San Francisco to New York. He was 45.
Per Lifetime’s description, “faced with unsurmountable grief, Kristine finds her voice and the strength to navigate and rebuild her family in the midst of profound loss.”
“I’m beyond excited. I never thought this would happen,” Carlson said Tuesday in a phone interview. “It’s kind of surreal to me, to be honest.”
The film will be Locklear’s first TV role since 2017. She is best known for starring in “Melrose Place,” “Spin City” and “Dynasty.” Carlson said she bonded with Locklear when the actress came to spend some time at her Martinez home.
“She wanted to get to know me as she’s becoming me,” Carlson said. “She’s a very warm and humble and empathetic person. … Unfortunately for her, she’s playing me in the worst year of my life. But she’s going to do an amazing job.”
The Lifetime project will also star Candace Cameron Bure’s daughter Natasha Bure (“Fuller House”) as Carlson’s daughter Jazzy, Jason MacDonald (“The Vampire Diaries”) as Dr. Richard Carlson and Emily Rose (“Haven”) as Richard’s booker, Brianna. This is the first project for McCain since recently leaving her role as a co-host on the daytime talk show “The View.”
The film is being shot in Nashville and is expected to premiere this fall on Lifetime.
Co-authors of the bestselling book series, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff,” Kristine and her husband Dr. Richard Carlson enjoyed a 25-year marriage and were raising two daughters in a beautiful home in Martinez. Over that time, Kristine was “comfortable living in Richard’s shadow.”
But after his death, she was forced to navigate the uncharted territory of becoming a single mom, while dealing with pressure to become the new face and voice of the “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” brand.
With sales of over 25 million copies, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” instructs readers on how to put challenges in perspective, reduce stress and anxiety through little daily changes, and how to let go of the small things to attain peace of mind in order to achieve goals.
Carlson expressed a desire that the film will be “full of hope for people in grief” during the pandemic.
Among the project’s strongest — and longest — supporters is producer Maura Dunbar, who, according to Carlson, had worked for 20-plus years trying to get a “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” film made. She actually sold the project twice before, but it stalled in development both time.
“Maura is really the fire behind the project,” Carlson said.
