Quick Summary
- Jonathan Roumie believes the new film ‘Solo Mio’ will save the romcom genre.
- ‘Solo Mio’ opens nationwide on Feb. 6.
- Film explores themes of male friendship and emotional connection.
At a moment when romantic comedies have been mainly relegated to streaming services or abandoned altogether in favor of increasingly raunchy plotlines, “The Chosen” star Jonathan Roumie believes his latest project, “Solo Mio,” is “saving the rom-com.”
“This is the perfect film to save the rom-com,” the 51-year-old actor told The Christian Post of the family-friendly Angel Studios film, which opens nationwide Feb. 6.
“You can’t watch this on your phone or on your iPad because you’re connected to distraction DMs and texts. You just need to be in a room surrounded by friends or family or strangers, experiencing the joy and the pain and the gasps and the shock that inevitably come with watching a story like this unfold together in a darkened cinema.”
“Solo Mio,” rated PG and set in Italy, centers on Matt Taylor (Kevin James), a mild-mannered art teacher left at the altar in Rome who decides to stay for the prepaid honeymoon anyway. As he moves through Italy alone, Matt encounters fellow honeymooners, among them a wannabe therapist named Neil, played by Roumie, and Julian (Kim Coates), who offer companionship, advice and, occasionally, chaos.
One of the film’s most striking throughlines is the bond between men and how male friendship can serve as a lifeline. It’s a theme audiences may recognize from Roumie’s work on “The Chosen,” where his portrayal of Jesus has prompted viewers, especially men and boys, to see Him as both strong and emotionally present.
“I think the notion of masculinity as a positive trait is just something that’s been kind of lost to the culture or kind of usurped by other forces and influences,” Roumie, a professing Catholic, said.
“And I think when you actually show what that looks like in everyday human relationships, you see that in ‘The Chosen,’ I’ve gotten a lot of response from children saying, ‘Oh, Jesus feels like He’s a man’s man, but He’s tender, and He loves, and He’s open-hearted.’ But that’s just masculinity. That’s what it means to be a man in society and trying to live life and provide for people.”
That same dynamic plays out in “Solo Mio,” where Neil and Julian both recognize Matt as “a brother in need,” even if they wildly disagree on how to help him.
“They try to both help him in very different ways, with very different ideas about how to help Matt,” Roumie said. “And Neil’s opinion, Julian’s out of his mind, and he’s giving Matt the worst advice. And Neil’s like, ‘I got the best advice,’ but he’s not necessarily qualified to give the advice he’s actually giving him.”
A physical therapist who married his own therapist, and thus takes on the identity of a therapist, Neil approaches emotional conflict with pen and notepad in hand.
“He takes his job seriously,” Roumie said, laughing. “He’s got the pen, he’s got the pad, and he’s all, ‘Tell me about it.’ I mean, he’s ready. He might not be qualified to be ready, but he’s certainly ready.”
The tension culminates in a scene Roumie described as one of the film’s emotional centers, where communication becomes the turning point. “I think communication is key, especially in that scene, and we get some resolutions as to what the next steps forward are after they kind of have it out.”
“They confront each other. They’re vulnerable. And that’s true to life,” he said. “You want to help people. You may not know what you’re doing. And somebody might call you out on it.”
Beneath the humor, “Solo Mio” asks audiences to examine what real love requires, as Matt is forced to consider what he wants from life and marriage. For Roumie, the answer is patience and courage.
“I think it requires patience,” he said. “And Dan, our director, says this a lot: it’s never too late to find true love. It’s never too late. And that can extend beyond finding true love. It’s never too late in life to do anything if you have the right support system and you commit a sense of faith to that.”
He continued: “You kind of go forward with this inner faith like, ‘OK, I can actually handle this. I think I can do this.’ And that’s Matt Taylor’s story. He’s over 50, and he’s getting married for the first time. And the whole film is about this journey to finding out what it means to find that true love, and it might not be what we thought it was.”
With emotional depth, frequent moments of levity and a few plot turns, Roumie said he believes audiences accustomed to formulaic rom-com endings will be pleasantly surprised by the film.
The actor traced the rom-com’s last great cinematic moment to the early 2000s, citing Will Smith’s “Hitch” as one of the genre’s final mainstream successes. “Solo Mio,” he emphasized, goes further by telling a more human, universally accessible story.
“It doesn’t matter what language you speak,” he said. “You could translate this into hundreds of languages, and people would still get it.”
The film’s appeal, he noted, cuts across generations. His teenage nieces found it “hysterical,” while men who expected not to enjoy it were surprised by how deeply they connected.
“Guys came up to us saying, ‘I didn’t think I’d like this, but I loved it,’” Roumie said. “They connected to guys being guys, trying to talk about their feelings, or maybe not quite able to, but still having those emotional moments.”
“You go through this roller coaster of emotions,” he added. “People come out just elated and feeling good because it’s wholesome. It’s not just for adults. It’s got something for everybody.”
“Solo Mio” hits theaters on Feb. 6.
Leah M. Klett is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: leah.klett@christianpost.com
