Mean Girls: Tina Fey Says New Movie Is Part of the “Multiverse”

Mean Girls hit theaters this weekend, and there’s been some confusion about the film’s place in North Shore High’s history. According to writer/producer/star, Tina Fey, the new movie is not quite a remake of the 2004 film or the Broadway adaptation, but rather a hybrid of both. Fey and Tim Meadows are reprising their roles from the original film while the rest of the cast is a mixture of Mean Girls newcomers and actors who appeared in the Broadway show. There are plenty of changes to the original story, but the return of Fey and Meadows has fans wondering if they’re playing the same versions of Ms. Norbury and Mr. Duvall. Warning: Spoilers Ahead! In the original film, the duo has a few flirtatious moments, but they are a full-fledged couple in the latest version. 

“Paramount was like, ‘We would like you to [play Ms. Norbury],’ and I could get my head around doing it if Tim [Meadows] would do it too,” Fey recently explained to Entertainment Weekly. “Because my best friend’s a teacher and teachers are there a long time. So I could get my head around the idea that we would still be there without breaking the universe and that we’d see these same patterns happening in front of us… and not look too closely at the fact that the kids have the same names.”

“They just got married at some point,” Fey added. “And Tim went to graduate school at some point, and he’s still in a cast. That joke is 90 percent just to amuse my old 30 Rock writing partner, Robert Carlock. After the first movie came out, he used to tease us both, ‘Your characters really are in love.’ So that joke is mostly for him.”

The new film also features a cameo from original Mean Girls star, Lindsay Lohan, so Fey also addressed if she is supposed to be playing an older version of her version of Cady.

“I wouldn’t look at it with a microscope. It doesn’t entirely make sense, but it’s a multiverse. That’s what it is. Yeah, it’s a Spider-Man,” Fey jokingly explained. ” I don’t really know those movies, so I don’t know if what I’m saying applies.”

What Is Mean Girls About? 

You can check out the official description for Mean Girls here: “From the comedic mind of Tina Fey comes a new twist on the modern classic, Mean Girls. New student Cady Heron (Angourie Rice) is welcomed into the top of the social food chain by the elite group of popular girls called ‘The Plastics,’ ruled by the conniving queen bee Regina George (Reneé Rapp) and her minions Gretchen (Bebe Wood) and Karen (Avantika). However, when Cady makes the major misstep of falling for Regina’s ex-boyfriend Aaron Samuels (Christopher Briney), she finds herself prey in Regina’s crosshairs. As Cady sets to take down the group’s apex predator with the help of her outcast friends Janis (Auli’i Cravalho) and Damian (Jaquel Spivey), she must learn how to stay true to herself while navigating the most cutthroat jungle of all: high school.” 

Mean Girls is now playing in theaters.