Tina Fey knew how fetch it would be if someone special made an appearance in the new Mean Girls movie musical.
Warning: Spoilers below for the 2024 Mean Girls movie.
“Paramount was like, ‘Can you get any of the original ladies? And I was like, ‘I can’t fit five people in,’” Fey, 53, told Entertainment Weekly in a Friday, January 12, interview. “I felt like if I could only get one person as a surprise, the original movie is really Lindsay [Lohan’s] movie. As great as they all are, she’s the heart of that movie.”
Fey, who wrote both the original and new version of the film, explained that she was also tasked with figuring out how Lohan, 37, could fit into the story seamlessly. “I thought, ‘Well, what could she do?’” she recalled. “I didn’t think [she should] play a teacher. I was trying to think of something that you wouldn’t expect.”
Eventually Fey figured out how to incorporate the original Cady Heron in a way that would feel special for fans. Lohan appears in the third act of the movie as a moderator during the Mathletes competition, which includes the new Cady, played by Angourie Rice.
“Just to have her do that late in the movie, it also feels like it comes, I hope, at a time where fans weren’t expecting one more little surprise,” Fey said. “It also lets her be smart, which Cady is.”
Lohan isn’t able to step back into Cady’s shoes, but her role in the 2024 flick allows her to be in the room for one of the character’s most famous lines: “The limit does not exist.”
In the scene, Lohan asks the mathletes difficult questions as Fey, who reprised her role as Ms. Norbury, looks on proudly. The film then slightly breaks the fourth wall, with Lohan mentioning that the competition has only ended in a tie “once before,” a nod to the same scene from the 2004 film. However, when Cady (Rice) asks why she didn’t pay attention more in limits class, Lohan cheekily replies, “Honey, I don’t know your life.”
“I was so nervous to meet her. I was sick to my stomach,” Rice, 23, told EW of her and Lohan’s crossover moment. “But it was so exciting because I love her performance in Mean Girls. I think she brings such an honesty to her performances and it’s just so special. And so to meet her was crazy.”
Rice’s fears turned out to be unfounded, as she said the pair bonded immediately over portraying the same character. “One of the first things she said to me was, ‘I feel like I know you because I played the same character,’ and that meant so much to me,” Rice shared. “It just felt so special because it’s really rare to play the same character as someone and get to meet them. It’s something I’ve never experienced before.”
The new installment of the teen comedy classic was initially greenlit in 2020, serving as an adaption of the Mean Girls Broadway musical, which was also written by Fey and premiered on stage in 2018. In addition to Rice as Cady, Renée Rapp — who also appeared in the stage version – portrays Regina George, while Avantika Vandanapu and Bebe Wood complete The Plastics as Gretchen Wieners and Karen Smith, respectively. Christopher Briney takes on the role of Aaron Samuels, Auli’i Cravalho is Janis ‘Imi’ike (formerly Ian) and Jaquel Spivey portrays Damian Hubbard.
As for the original cast, three-fourths of The Plastics, Lohan, Lacey Chabert and Amanda Seyfried, recently reunited for a Mean Girls-inspired Walmart ad in December 2023, reprising their characters. Lohan also made a surprise red carpet appearance at the Mean Girls premiere in New York City earlier this month.
“It’s stood the test of time,” she told Entertainment Tonight of the OG film while walking the red carpet. “I feel really grateful. I mean, it’s not very often that you have all these movies that do that. Mean Girls really opened the doors for a lot of things going on in schools. I think it’s also a really fun movie, so it’s really a blessing.”
Mean Girls is now playing in theaters.
