The Way Home made viewers fall in love with Alice and Nick’s unattainable romance, but will the fictional couple find their way back to each other despite an age gap caused by time travel?
During an exclusive interview with Us Weekly, Sadie Laflamme-Snow gushed about how Alice’s connection with Nick (Samuel Braun) in 1994 helped her develop her character, saying, “Oh my heart. I love the Alice and Nick story line. It is such an anchor point for me playing Alice. It was one of the first times we really saw her open up.”
Laflamme-Snow, 25, recalled how it took a while for Alice to show herself to others. “She was really going through a hard time at the beginning. So the first time we see her sing on Nick’s request at the beach in front of all these strangers, you really see her for the first time as a young girl and she’s just vulnerable,” she shared. “It’s so beautiful.”
Despite feeling the chemistry between Alice and teenage Nick, Laflamme-Snow was still caught off guard by the overwhelming fan support.
“I didn’t know people were going to be so attached. But it was almost like, as time went on, people got more attached to their relationship and the more they became star-crossed lovers,” she noted. “We saw them at the house party [in season 1] and they were at the masquerade seeing each other through the glass. It’s like the more they got pulled apart, the more people wanted them to come together.”
The Way Home, which premiered in 2023, introduced three generations of women in the Landry family who stumble onto a pond on their land that allows them to time travel. Alice was the first one to make the discovery, which led to her going back in time when her mother, Kat (Chyler Leigh), was her age. That paved the way for Alice to find love with teen Kat (Alex Hook) and teen Elliot’s (David Webster) childhood friend, Nick.
“For Nick to finally find out that Alice had time traveled in season 2, obviously that was the most disruptive thing of all time to them being able to act normal in the present day,” Laflamme-Snow told Us about how season 2 introduced adult Nick, played by Kerry James. “I, of course, love that story and would go back there anytime.”
Laflamme-Snow isn’t sure how The Way Home could make Nick a part of Alice’s future.
“Alice needs to be in a place of focusing on her future and we see that with Noah [Alexander Eling],” she added about her character’s newest love interest. “When she’s having a hard time with someone in her family — it’s all informed by time travel — which is the most unusual set of circumstances. [With Noah] she can just be a teenager. It’s something that she really needs.”
The actress isn’t ruling out a return from Nick — even if it is in adult form. “We’ll see how Alice and Nick in present day awkwardness can work herself out,” she teased. “Kerry James — who plays Nick — is so much fun to work with. It’s funny to see them just sort of pretend that they don’t know each other but also be forced in a small town to constantly bump into each other. It was handled beautifully.”
Laflamme-Snow’s costars Chyler Leigh and Evan Williams highlighted how The Way Home was able to address an age gap romance “without making it even weirder” for the audience.
“One of the things that this feels most holistic about the show is that thematically we’re always investigating this question of, ‘Is it better to try to change the past or change our relationship to the past?’ That allows us to exist in the present in the future,” Williams, 39, explained to Us. “We see the audience and all of the characters — in their own ways — grappling with that question.”
He continued: “Obviously there are things that the heart wants but we’re also watching the characters navigate that. One of the most realistic things about the show is we see the characters not necessarily always get what they think they want.”
While discussing the show’s success three seasons in, the trio expressed gratitude for the passionate support from fans.
“There’s a really interesting combination where our show airs on Friday night so it’s like appointment viewing. It’s not all streamed all at the same time so people can’t really binge it. They have to wait a week,” Williams said. “So they’re going to do all their theorizing about everything. But the past episodes and past seasons are available via streaming. So it’s a combination of both appointment viewing and streaming. We get the most of both worlds.”
The Way Home airs on the Hallmark Channel Fridays at 9 p.m. ET. New episodes are also available to stream on Hallmark+ and Peacock the next day.
With reporting by Christina Garibaldi
