Netflix’s Hot Frosty has been kicked off the top spot by The Merry Gentlemen (Picture: Katrina Marcinowski/Netflix)
Netflix’s new number one movie comes from its impressive catalogue of original festive flicks for 2024, dethroning its competitor with a very similar strategy and nabbing nearly 15,000,000 views in the process.
The streaming platform has become incredibly thirsty going into the Christmas season and its new top film follows a similar steamy sell – namely, semi-naked men.
Following hot on the heels of Hot Frosty, a retelling of the Frosty the Snowman tale from the iconic song that replaces him with a hot and chiselled topless ice snow sculpture that comes to life, Netflix’s latest seasonal slice of entertainment multiplies the male nudity.
In The Merry Gentlemen, Broadway dancer Ashley (Britt Robertson) decides that the only way she can save her parents’ small-town performing venue is to stage an all-male, Christmas-themed revue – obviously.
Enter twinkly local carpenter Luke (Chad Michael Murray), who happens to take very little convincing to remove his shirt and gyrate onstage with three to four other local men.
The fact that Sycamore Creek has even one man willing to strip and dance in public, let alone do it night after night as part of a troupe, requires an intense suspension of disbelief from the audience.
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The Merry Gentlemen sees Chad Michael Murray’s carpenter Luke join an all-male dance revue to help save a local venue (Picture: Katrina Marcinowski/Netflix)
It rivals Hot Frosty for chiselled male abs (Picture: Netflix)
But The Merry Gentlemen has not captured its 14.7million views – from 21.6m hours watched in just its first three days of release – by being subtle.
Indeed, Murray first gets to show off his ripped physique by popping up from under the bar where Luke’s been fixing a sink topless, holding a spanner to his forehead in surprise as ‘evidence’, because… reasons.
With one hot bod guaranteed, it’s then supremely helpful that Colt Prattes’ bartender Troy, Hector David Jr’s cab driver Ricky, retired grumpy barfly Danny (Grease 2 star Maxwell Caulfield’s casting gives the game away here) and Ashley’s brother-in-law Rodger (Marc Anthony Samuel) are all conveniently revealed to be more than up to the task at hand too.
So appreciative fans are then treated to multiple routines with themes/outfits from construction workers and cowboys to a Fosse-inspired number with suspenders and bowler hats – and Luke even finishes one of these by pulling down his jeans to reveal underwear emblazoned with ‘naughty elf’.
Many fans have been delighted over what The Merry Gentlemen has on offer (Picture: Katrina Marcinowski/Netflix)
Britt Robertson stars as Ashley, the Broadway dancer who puts together the male troupe (Picture: Katrina Marcinowski/Netflix)
‘Chad Michael Murray: plumber, heartthrob, legend,’ posted @Giz_Trade on X, while @denby95711 quipped: ‘Chad fixing a sink? The perfect blend of mystery and charm! Five stars!’
‘The Merry Gentlemen is an excellent Christmas movie. No plot, just shirtless Chad Michael Murray for an hour and a half. And that’s really all you need tbh,’ advised @OMG_Alanna.
‘The Merry Gentlemen: Chad Michael Murray sexy dances like Magic Mike to Christmas music and falls in love along the way. I give it a solid 5 Chads out of 6 Michael Murrays,’ tweeted @FailPrime.
Rival Hot Frosty has not fallen far though, as it’s still in second place on Netflix’s top 10 chart, adding a further 12.7m views to its tally, making for an impressive overall total of 28.7m so far.
Hot Frosty has amassed nearly 29million views so far (Picture: Petr Maur/Netflix)
Christina Milian’s festive film Meet Me Next Christmas is also still pulling in views, now in seventh place but adding another 5.9m views to make 35.8m altogether.
There is still more being gifted to viewers by Netflix this season as today marks the release of Lindsay Lohan’s seasonal vehicle Our Little Secret.
It follows acrimonious exes (Lohan and Pretty Little Liars star Ian Harding), who are forced to spend the festive period together after discovering they are now dating siblings.
The Merry Gentlemen is streaming now on Netflix.
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