There’s only one Saint Nick in Tim Allen’s house. The “Home Improvement” alum admitted – after his daughter seamlessly roasted him — that he’ll only watch a Santa Claus movie if it’s, well, his own.
“Every Christmas we watch all three of them,” Elizabeth Allen-Dick told The Post in a joint interview for Season 2 of “The Santa Clauses.”
“We do watch other movies! Not many,” the vet actor chimed in. “We do watch other people, other actors.”
According to Allen-Dick, however, the choices are very limited.
She deadpanned: “But he also won’t watch any other Santa Claus movies other than himself.”
“No, I don’t mind ‘It’s a Wonderful Life,’” he teased. “But Santa Claus movies I get kind of proprietary about.” (He also watches his and Jamie Lee Curtis’ 2004 comedy “Christmas with the Kranks.”)
The “Last Man Standing” alum, 70, has specific Santa requirements too.
“I can’t watch another Santa Claus movie. Especially when they’re bad Santas,” he elaborated to The Post. “I know there are people that like the ugly Santa movies but sometimes I’m like, ‘Eh, I don’t know if I like bad Santas.’ You know, dressed up with knives and stabbing. I don’t like that.”
Allen-Dick further teased her famous dad, noting that not watching his own work is the very “opposite of him.”
“Wow, wow, that’s hurtful,” Allen said.
“You think differently?” she questioned.
“No, I do not mind watching myself,” he relented. “I don’t, like, stare at myself in the mirror more than an hour a day.”
The father-daughter pair star as Scott Calvin (Santa) and Sandra, respectively, on the Disney+ series, which returned for more episodes on Nov. 8. The show is a continuation from Allen’s films “The Santa Clause” (1994), “The Santa Clause 2” (2002) and “The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause” (2006).
“I’m not judging other shows. [But] this started with a director named John Pasquin, who added heart to Scott Calvin,” Allen told The Post. “So it wasn’t just a comedy. It really put another layer onto this about his family and about what he is. And as we’ve opened up and answered the questions, it wasn’t a mistake that Scott Calvin was picked.”
“And that Santa, as we find out in last season, he didn’t die when he slid off the roof. He turned back in and they had decided — the legendary figures and the Santa Clause — to turn him into Santa Clause. And so it’s his personality that is necessary. You needed this guy. Christmas needed this guy. And I love all that.”
The “Toy Story” actor “loved” how Scott is an “emotional guy” and that writers showed “all of his flaws.”
“I mean, clearly, he’s pretty perfect. The actor, I was able to bring the perfection out of this guy,” Allen laughed, giving himself a pat on the back.
“I said that he is a flawed individual. And really knows in a couple of scenes — I love when he accepts [Sandra’s] magic. And he said, ‘Look at where we are,’” he recalled. “He’s aware of the magic that he’s in. … The magic is there. The humanness is really, really responsive.”
Luckily for Allen, his red outfit is also something to rave about — after initially dealing with a very heavy and hot fat suit on the movie sets.
“The costumers and the makeup people have gotten very, very good at this where it may not last as long on camera, but I’m not in it. It doesn’t take 3.5 hours of very uncomfortable procedure to get in it. Now they can get it into the hour and a half zone,” the actor explained. “That part is better, much better than it was. I don’t get all the sympathy. ‘Oh, poor guy. Here, have some candy.’ I mean, I don’t get that anymore.”
What’s also changed is his scene partner.
“He always told me to add value to what I was saying,” Allen-Dick said of what acting advice her dad has given her. “So even if I was reading lines off of a script … that someone else wrote, I can still make it my own, which is really important for character development.”
“The Santa Clauses” drops new episodes Wednesdays on Disney+.
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