'The Thanksgiving Text': Netflix Movie About Viral Story Of Grandma Accidentally Inviting Stranger To Thanksgiving

There are some heartwarming moments that we often wish to immortalize.

One such moment the whole internet was in on since the beginning and has been following year after year was when Wanda Dench sent a Thanksgiving invitation text to a total stranger, Jamal Hinton, thinking it was her grandson's number. Hinton decided to make the best of the situation and invited himself to her home for the holiday anyway. "Of course you can," she had replied at the time. "That's what grandmas do ... feed everyone." He shared this heartwarming exchange, which then went viral.

This happened in 2016, and a new tradition had been started. Six years later, the two are still celebrating Thanksgiving together and have been keeping the rest of the internet in the loop as well. Hinton shared the annual update on Twitter and wrote: "We are all set for year 6!" He also attached a picture of a text message from Dench inviting him, his girlfriend Mikaela, and his family over, along with a photo of himself, Dench, Mikaela, and Dench's late husband Lonnie, who died last year after a battle with COVID-19. This story gets shared around the holiday time and just goes to show all the kindness there is to go around.

This story of unlikely friendships, kindness, and love is about to see bigger horizons. Netflix has decided to make a movie out of this heartfelt cultural moment and bless the world with some feel-good content, reported Variety.

The film is titled The Thanksgiving Text and will recount the story of how it all began with the hilarious text exchange between Dench and Hinton. In the initial conversation, after Dench had sent the invitation to whom she assumed was her grandson, Hinton was confused about who he received a text from and asked to see the person calling themselves his grandma. He asked Dench to send a picture of herself, and then he sent his own. He was in high school at the time. They have come a long way since.

"We are excited to share our story with the world. We hope it inspires more people to reach out and make connections that they wouldn't ordinarily make," Dench and Hinton said in a joint statement. "We are so blessed to find a genuine friendship brought together by God from a mistaken text message." Abdul Williams (Salt-N-Pepa, The Bobby Brown Story) is set to write the screenplay. The director for the film has not yet been decided. The casting for the film is yet to be finalized as well. The film will be produced by Robert Teitel and George Tillman, Jr. for State Street Pictures with Lawrence Mott, who will serve as an executive producer. A release date has not been confirmed yet either.