EXCLUSIVE: Ashley Williams Says Sparks Fly on Hallmark’s First-Ever Dating Show

Former sitcom star and Hallmark Channel fan favorite Ashley Williams has fallen in love with helping people fall in love.

The “How I Met Your Mother” alum jumped at the chance to host Hallmark’s first-ever dating show — “Small Town Setup,” premiering on Hallmark+ on January 2, 2025 — but had no idea just how much she’d love her new role.

“It would be my dream to do it again,” she told EntetertainmentNOW ahead of the series’ premiere. “I had the best time. I would do it again in a heartbeat.”

With all six episodes available to stream on January 2, Williams is excited to get viewers’ reactions as they watch successful city-dwelling singles return to their small hometowns, open to finding a love connection there. That common Hallmark movie trope becomes a real-life situation in “Small Town Setup,” as the featured singles’ parents and communities carefully choose three potential suitors to go on dates with them.

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Ashley Williams Pitched Hallmark Multiple Unscripted Shows Before Landing ‘Small Town Setup’

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Produced by Keshet Studios for Hallmark, “Small Town Setup” is based on Keshet’s popular Israeli docuseries “Dear Neighbors.”

“They’re really good at what they do,” Williams told EntertainmentNOW of the Keshet team, noting how “thorough, professional, kind and loving” they were while helping her get to know the families and communities hoping to create a love connection.

“I really was able to get to know all these people in an intimate way,” she said. “I meet with the parents first, and the family members, to get to know their single, grown child. I see the house they grew up in, I see their hometown, and I then go and meet with their entire community.”

Williams, who also served as an executive producer on the series, then oversaw town halls to meet community members who knew the singles they were trying to set up, from childhood friends to former colleagues.

She explained, “I wanted to know, like, ‘What was this girl like when she was a kid? What was she into? What’s her style, what’s her taste, what are her passions? Who is she?’ And then the parents surprise (the person) with three dates that the town has sort of come up with together … and then we all watched the dates live.”

Williams fell in love with playing matchmaker and host, telling EntertainmentNOW that she’s long been a “massive fan” of “Live With Kelly and Mark” host Kelly Ripa, who transitioned from acting to daytime hosting in 2001.

“When I had the opportunity to host a show of any kind, I leaped at the opportunity,” Williams said, revealing that when she heard Hallmark was interested in producing unscripted series, she pitched nine “very weird, outside the box ideas” the network passed on. But, knowing her passion for the genre, Hallmark eventually offered her “Small Town Setup.”

“I just said, ‘Oh my gosh, 1000 times yes,'” she recalled. “Because here’s the cool thing. You know, we all love reality TV, it’s easy to digest, it’s sort of popcorn television. But there is nothing salacious about an unscripted show for Hallmark. We don’t want anyone to look stupid on our show. It’s not a ‘gotcha’ show. It is feel-good and truly, from top to bottom, we all had the exact same objective, which was we really wanted people to fall in love.”

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Ashley Williams Teases ‘Huge Success’ of ‘Small Town Setup’ Matchups

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Williams told EntertainmentNOW that sparks did fly among some of the matched-up singles, but that she feels like the “Small Town Setup” experiment was a “huge success” for multiple reasons.

“People fell in love,” Williams gushed. “But to me, even (beyond) that outcome, it was a huge success because I feel like a lot of the people who who were set up on the blind dates got more clear with themselves about what they were looking for in a relationship.”

Married since 2011 to film producer Neal Dodson, Williams said she “can’t even imagine” navigating the world of online dating, noting that singles often share only what they think will attract others to them. But she said on “Small Town Setup,” several people realized they’d been casting their nets far too wide and attracting “matches” who really didn’t align with their their values, passions and dreams.

“I think what a lot of the people (on the show) learned is that it behooves them to be very honest about what they’re looking for,” she said. “We had a couple of women who were like, ‘Yeah, I do want to have kids,’ which was not on their Bumble profile, you know? They were trying to kind of play it cool. But after our show, I think a lot of them were like, ‘You know what? Now I think I’m going to be more clear about what I’m looking for.'”

Williams told EntertainmentNOW that the outcome she loved “more than anything else” was witnessing how each person gained “a better understanding of how much their parents loved them and wanted them to be happy, which was so heartwarming and sweet.”

“Small Town Setup” begins streaming on January 2 via Hallmark+, which offers a free weeklong trial to new members.