Jean Smart has joined the cast of The Families Stone, the sequel to Esprit de famille, a Christmas dramedy released in 2005. The actress will share the screen with Craig T. Nelson, Sarah Jessica Parker, Rachel McAdams, Claire Danes, Dermot Mulroney and Luke Wilson. Principal photography is set to begin in the fall of 2026 in New York, with no release date announced yet.
Twenty years after their mother's disappearance, the Stone family reunites for Christmas. The gathering takes an unexpected turn when Kelly Stone, their father, invites the woman he fell in love with to meet his children. This new character will be played by Jean Smart, best known for her role as Deborah Vance in the series Hacks.
The actress joins a large portion of the cast from the first film. Sarah Jessica Parker will reprise the role of Meredith Morton, while Rachel McAdams, Claire Danes, Dermot Mulroney, Craig T. Nelson and Luke Wilson will again play Amy, Julie, Everett, Kelly and Ben. Tyrone Giordano, Elizabeth Reaser, Paul Schneider and Brian White are also lined up for the cast.
Thomas Bezucha, screenwriter and director of Esprit de famille, returns to write and direct this sequel. The first film followed Meredith, invited to spend Christmas with her partner Everett’s family. Her personality quickly clashed with the Stone clan’s tight-knit, nonconformist dynamics, during holidays marked by family tensions, romantic upheaval, and Sybil’s illness.
Portrayed by Diane Keaton, Sybil was a central figure in the story. The Family Stone will weave her absence into the narrative by reuniting the family two decades after her disappearance. The arrival of the character played by Jean Smart will not be about replacing the matriarch, but about forcing her loved ones to face a new chapter in Kelly's life.
The original title The Families Stone has been officially retained by Searchlight Pictures. No French title has been announced yet: Esprit de famille 2 could serve as a descriptive label for the project, but at this stage it is not its official title in France.
With an almost entirely reassembled cast and a plot again set during the holidays, The Families Stone aims to extend the saga of this family that has become inseparable from Christmas cinema, while tackling grief, the passage of time, and the possibility of a fresh start.
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