The Hating Game is a romantic comedy film directed by Peter Hutchings and starring Lucy Hale and Austin Stowell. The film, which was announced in May 2019, is based on Sally Thorne’s best-selling novel and tells the story of Lucy Hutton (Hale) and her cold, efficient enemy Joshua Templeton (Stowell).
After signing an agreement with Mister Smith Entertainment in July 2021, Vertical Entertainment secured the North American distribution rights to the rom-com. Together with BCDF Pictures, Convergent Media, and Digital Caviar, the latter film production business, owned by David Garrett, is responsible for selling the film’s rights in the American Film Market.
‘The Hating Game’: Cast and Release Date
Following the announcement of the film in 2019, production began on November 21 in upstate New York. Following that, many reports on the film surfaced, including clues of a release date. Variety said that the picture will be released in theaters in late 2021, despite the fact that the information was just incomplete.
The Hating Game has a superb extended ensemble that includes Nicholas Baroudi, Gina Torres, Corbin Bernsen, Billy Thomas, and Tania Asnes, in addition to Pretty Little Liars star Hale and Fantasy Island’s Stowell.
Stowell was not the first option to play the lead against Hale, which is interesting. Robbie Amell, who plays the Flash, was the first actor to be cast in the role. However, owing to a scheduling difficulty, Amell had to withdraw out of the project.
A novel-based story
According to Thorne’s work, The Hating Game recounts the lives of Hutton and Templeton, who have a love-hate relationship. As previously stated, the rom-com is based on Thorne’s best-selling novel of the same name. The novel was named the 2018 USA Today bestseller after being published in more than 20 countries. The film’s synopsis runs as follows:
Lucy starts on a merciless game of one-upmanship against Josh, resolved to achieve professional success without compromising her ethics, a rivalry that is impossible to complicate by her developing desire to him.
Mister Smith Entertainment’s Garrett remarked in a press release that the film is a “gloriously humorous” intimate love story with a wide audience appeal. He also mentioned that his studio was looking for films with a specific target demographic, and The Hating Game fit the bill. With such glowing reviews, fans have been anticipating the release of the official movie trailer as well as the film itself.
Novel Reviews and Ratings
On GoodReads, the novel has received an average rating of 4.11 out of 5 from over 253,133 individuals.
“I honestly believe The Hating Game is the kind of book that everyone would appreciate – beautifully written in a really engaging way, gripping from the start and great if you adore enemies to lovers stories,” one user commented while rating the book five stars.
Another person wrote, “What was it about The Hating Game that I adored? Everything. Everything in this book appealed to me. Nothing beats the sense of flying high after finishing a book by an author you’ve never read before.”
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“I wasn’t sure about this till the end, but once I got there, I was squeaaaaaling”
Based on the glowing reviews for the book, it’s safe to say that the film will be well worth the wait.
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