In 2004, the iconic movie Mean Girls came out and made a huge impact. In 2018, Mean Girls, the stage musical, came out on Broadway. Now in 2024, the movie adaptation of the musical hit theaters on Friday, January 12th.
There are only three main differences between this movie and the original in 2004: the musical pieces, the cast, and the time period. There were minor line changes and things, but other than that everything else is mainly the same, such as the plot and setting– we are still at North Shore High School. The cast consists of some new faces, but there are also some actors playing the same roles that they played in the original. Such as Tina Fey (Mrs. Norbury) and Tim Meadows (Principal Duvall). Lindsay Lohan, who was Cady Heron in the original, made a surprise appearance as well, as the host of the mathletes competition near the end of the movie. The main cast of the new movie were many fresh faces that you may have seen before but aren’t super popular. Reneé Rapp, who plays the queen bee, Regina George, in the movie played Regina George on Broadway when she was just 19 years old. She also played Leighton in The Sex Lives Of College Girls. Snow Angel, her debut album, also recently came out. Angourie Rice who plays Cady Heron was seen as Betty in the newer Spiderman movies aside Tom Holland. There are so many other amazing people in the main cast, but we can’t talk about them all.
The movie being a musical took some viewers by surprise. Junior Kristina Mayer stated, “No, I didn’t know it was a musical.” She also exclaimed, “The songs actually really annoyed me and I feel like the movie would’ve been better without them. However, I did enjoy the fact that each character had their own songs to introduce themselves to the audience.” Sophomore Hannah Moffa added, “I feel like a lot of songs lacked emotion when compared to the actual musical.” I would agree with this. There were also songs cut from the original musical that did not make it into the movie. However, there was one person in particular who made the songs more enjoyable– Reneé Rapp. “Casting Reneé Rapp [was great] because she ate every musical number and I enjoyed them more than the original,” Junior Leah Coleman expressed. There was also one character that was agreed upon that they wished had been changed: Christopher Briney. You may have also seen him as Conrad in the show adaptation of the book by Jenny Han, The Summer I Turned Pretty. “I wish they cast a better male actor,” Junior Syleena Carter stated. Kristina added, “Christopher Briney didn’t add any depth to Aaron’s character; I wasn’t very impressed with his performance.”
Overall the movie had mixed reviews, making it around 7/10. It will eventually be streaming on Paramount + and other streaming services. So if you do have a chance to see it, you should, but don’t forget you will be able to see it on streaming services in a few months.
