Where to watch Mean Girls (2004)

Trivia & production notes

• Tina Fey came up with the idea to adapt Queen Bees and Wannabes into a film and pitched it to Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels, who then helped secure the film rights from Paramount Pictures.
• Since the source book was nonfiction, Fey wrote the entire plot from scratch, drawing on her own high school experiences and her time in the Chicago area.
• The character Janis Ian was named after the folk singer who performed on the first Saturday Night Live episode, and her song 'At Seventeen' plays during the fight scene at Regina's house.
• Lindsay Lohan was initially going to play Regina George but was switched to the lead role of Cady Heron because executives worried the villain part would damage her public image.
• Director Mark Waters cast Rachel McAdams as Regina partly because her real-life politeness contrasted with the character's meanness, and because he sensed Lohan felt intimidated by her.
• Blake Lively was the top choice to play Karen Smith but producers told her to keep looking for other roles.
• Jonathan Bennett was hired as Aaron Samuels as a last-minute replacement after the original actor was fired days into filming.
• Tina Fey cast Jonathan Bennett partly because of his resemblance to her longtime SNL co-star Jimmy Fallon.
• The film was shot mostly in Toronto and surrounding areas despite being set in Illinois, with principal photography taking place from late September through November 2003.
• The original title for the film was going to be Homeschooled before it was changed to Mean Girls.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Mean Girls, available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Rewritten for StreamShack; errors are ours — tell us about them.