'The Santa Clauses': Tim Allen Talks Mad Santa Eric Stonestreet, Working With Daughter Again (Exclusive)

Tim Allen and his daughter, Elizabeth Allen-Dick, reunite again in Disney+'s 'The Santa Clauses.'

Tim Allen is ready to tackle the forces of evil when season 2 of The Santa Clauses premieres Wednesday on Disney+, and only ET was on the set to chat with Allen about one of the new protagonists, mad Santa Eric Stonestreet.

In season 2, Allen, reprising his role as Scott Calvin/Santa Claus, is the good Santa who is suddenly elbowed by mad Santa, played by the Modern Family star. Mad Santa wants back in at the North Pole, but he finds it challenging given his checkered history. 

"There's a legend of previous Santa 700. He ran for seven hundred years. He was one of the better ones," Allen says. "[He] kind of went off the rails, like a biblical figure that got too full of himself, and he thought things should be done a certain way."

Allen continues, "Well, he somehow gets back and wants to be part of the North Pole. And the current Santa is a very different breed. He's the first human Santa, as we got through last season."

Stonestreet and Allen do battle in the North Pole in just about every manner, including who has the better Santa belly. As mad Santa tells it, he was wrongly exiled from the North Pole, though he concedes in the show that he was "very mean" and "very unfair."

"And then my heart turned because I started trusting someone that I shouldn't," Stonestreet tells ET. "And they decided to rebel against me, and they turned me into a nutcracker. So, I've been a nutcracker for at least 400 years and something happens. I don't want to say what, but gets me out of the nutcracker. So now I'm back to take what is rightfully mine."

Tim Allen and Elizabeth Allen-Dick at D23 Expo in 2022. - Getty

Not if Allen has anything to say about that, especially since he considers himself an emissary of sorts. He proudly takes on that role especially with his daughter, Elizabeth Allen-Dick, playing his TV daughter as well. 

"It's father-daughter, and it's also actor-actor," says Allen of the nature of their familial and professional relationship. "It's also a mentor and actor and all three of them combine on the set because it's very peculiar how life imitates art."

Speaking to ET last November ahead of the season 1 premiere, Allen shared that he initially asked that Elizabeth be included in the production as an "elf just in the background," but that idea changed after Elizabeth's audition.

"There's like 40 elves... they aren't in many scenes, they just walk by. And I just want one and she would wave to all my family," the actor shared with ET at the time, adding that he didn't want Elizabeth taken away from her studies and activities. "They said, 'Well, she should read for it...' She read the first time [and] to see her do that line so well -- I even went, 'Wow, that was really good.'"

"Everybody in the Zoom was looking at me, I could see how there was this longest pause [and] they go, 'Uh, has she ever done that before?' I said, 'I don't think so,'" Tim recalled proudly. "It was such a long pause... I'll never forget everybody staring at my Zoom box... She drilled a very difficult mood joke and she kept on it all the way through. They said, 'We're gonna let her read some other people,' and then they gave her the part! I said it had very little to do [with the fact] that she's related to me, she earned it and it was wonderful to be there."

Season 2 also features Tracy Morgan as the Easter Bunny, Elizabeth Mitchell as Mrs. Claus/Carol; Austin Kane as Cal Calvin Claus; Devin Bright as Noel and Gabriel "Fluffy" Iglesias as Kris Kringle.

Matilda Lawler will also reprise her role of Santa's chief of staff, Betty, as a recurring guest star along with Marta Kessler as Olga, Liam Kyle as Gary, Isabella Bennett as Edie, Sasha Knight as Crouton, Ruby Jay as Riley, Mia Lynn Bangunan as Pontoon, and Laura San Giacomo as La Befana, the Christmas Witch. 

The two-episode season 2 premiere of The Santa Clauses is available now on Disney+. 

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