15. Fey famously never considered writing a sequel to the hit film, a decision she’s gone on record as regretting. “At the time we did want to start the conversation about the sequel, and for whatever reason I was like, ‘No!!! We shouldn’t do that!'” she told EW in 2014. “Now I look back and I’m like, ‘Why?’ But now, no—it’s too late now.”
As she told Variety in 2018, however, “Maybe it’s better, because we can save all the energy for this.”
This being the Mean Girls musical she wrote with husband and 30 Rock composer Jeff Richmond that premiered in 2017 before opening on Broadway in April 2018. Nominated for 12 Tony Awards and nine Drama Desk Awards that year, it won Fey the award for Outstanding Book of a Musical at the latter and served as inspiration for 2024’s Mean Girls musical.
And while there’s been no sequel ever made, there has been a film produced bearing the moniker Mean Girls 2. The made-for-TV “sequel” aired on ABC Family (now Freeform) in 2011 and was a stand-alone story that had nothing to do with the original film aside from having Tim Meadows reprise his role as the school’s principal. It was not well-received.
In 2024, Mean Girls, a film adaptation of the musical, was released. Angourie Rice played Cady and Reneé Rapp reprised her Broadway role as Regina. Other cast members included Bebe Wood (Gretchen) Avantika (Karen), Jaquel Spivey (Damian), Auli’i Cravalho (Janis) and Christopher Briney (Aaron).