It's been nearly two decades since Tina Fey's iconic 2004 flick Mean Girls catapulted Cady, Regina and the rest of the Plastics into the epicenter of the pop culture zeitgeist. With a star-studded reboot on the horizon, Chicago-born, New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Keishin Armstrong debuts her revealing new book, So Fetch: The Making of Mean Girls (And Why We're Still So Obsessed with It) (Harper Collins). The juicy publication explores the making of the iconic comedy, behind-the-scenes anecdotes and a plethora of exclusive interviews with the original cast, crew and director.
Here, the pop-culture pundit offers a totally fetch peek at the forthcoming book.
What inspired you to write this book?
I mostly write books that are cultural histories of specific TV shows or movies, so it always starts with that, and then it narrows quickly to which of them has a genuinely interesting backstory and a significant and lasting cultural influence. Most TV shows and movies, even good ones, don't live up to this standard! Mean Girls was particularly interesting to me because of a variety of factors: it introduced Tina Fey as a major cultural force, it dealt with 2000s feminism, it interacted with 2000s tabloid culture (and the horrific way that culture treated young women), it dealt with bullying before social media made it infinitely worse, it was a foundational force in the internet as we know it (because of memes and GIFs), and it's something that feels more relevant than ever as evidenced by the new movie/musical. So there was plenty to talk about, and that's all beside just being a fun, funny, endlessly quotable movie.
What were some of the most surprising/revealing stories or anecdotes you learned during your research?
There were so many fun little stories, and most of my favorites involve the ancillary characters who had one or two great lines but lived on infamy because of internet memes. Perhaps my absolute favorite was one who had no lines, the guy who played Glen Coco. David Reale, the actor, wasn't hired for the movie at all. But he was a starving actor at the time, and he had a lot of friends who were extras or had small parts in the movie. They shot in Toronto, so all of the high schoolers were played by young Canadian actors. He heard they were shooting across the street from where he lived, so he went over to say hi to friends and snag some food from the craft services table on set. While he was there, the director, Mark Waters, spotted him and said, "Hey, I have a role for you, he has a name and everything!" It wasn't clear whether he knew David had not been hired, since David had, in fact, auditioned for the movie, but was not offered a role. David went with it, and soon he was in wardrobe receiving an alternate outfit for one of his two scenes. He'd wear his own clothes in one, and the alternate clothes in the other. You can see him quite prominently sitting right in front of Gretchen Weiners when she gives her impassioned Julius Caesar speech in English class, and you can see the back of his head in the very famous scene in which he, Glen Coco, receives an impressive four candy cane-grams at Christmas time and Damian, as the Santa, says, "You go, Glen Coco!" David went on to have a successful acting career on TV and stage. It wasn't until more than a decade later that the internet figured out who had played Glen Coco, and David Reale started to get recognized for the role, which he's now really proud of, or at least very amused by.
What was your favorite part of the writing process?
I like different parts for different reasons! The research is always fun because you're immersing yourself in something like Mean Girls and its release date in 2004. But I also really enjoy the part where I just get to write what I think and let things flow.
Author Jennifer Keishin Armstrong
Which characters were most influential to you and why?
I have to think that Regina George was the most influential by far. Cady is central to the plot, but any reference people make to this movie now has to do with Regina and her manipulative dominance over whatever social situation she's in.
What are you most excited for readers to learn about Mean Girls through the book?
I would love for people to realize how important and influential this movie for and about teen girls was and is. It's incredibly funny, which is a testament to its writer, Tina Fey, and its cast, as well as director Mark Waters. And that includes the casting directors who put all of these people in these roles, Marci Liroff and Robin Cook. Casting directors don't always get their due, but they make all of the difference. This film essentially built the internet we now know via early memes, and it's hard to overstate the influence it had.
So Fetch drops Jan. 16
Photography by: Photos courtesy of subject
