A revival of the popular Disney Channel series “Lizzie McGuire” should have been a dream come true for ‘90s and ‘00s kids who saw the character that launched Hilary Duff’s career go from an awkward teenager to singing a duet with an Italian pop superstar at a sold-out concert. After all, it was among the first projects announced for the Disney+ platform, but the show’s road to the screen has been anything but what dreams are made of.
A month after the original series creator and revival showrunner Terri Minsky was fired after only two episodes and the production stalled, Hilary Duff herself took to Instagram to publicly ask Disney to consider moving her show to Hulu so they could let the show tell an adult story of an adult 30-year-old-woman instead of a kid’s show starring an adult. The news comes after Disney+ received some criticism online from moving the planned “Love, Simon” spin-off series to Hulu after deeming it not “family-friendly” enough for the Disney brand. On Tuesday night, Duff posted a screenshot of the headline on an Instagram story, circling the words “family-friendly” and writing “Sounds familiar.”
Her message seems clear enough, and a report from Variety seems to confirm that the “Lizzie McGuire” revival was also deemed not “family-friendly” enough for Disney, with Minsky telling Variety “Hilary has a grasp of Lizzie McGuire at 30 that needs to be seen. It’s a wonderful thing to watch. I would love the show to exist, but ideally I would love it if it could be given that treatment of going to Hulu and doing the show that we were doing.”
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This comes as a bit of a surprise, as Disney execs were reportedly fully aware and supportive of the project from the time it was pitched to filming, with executives “onset and were aware of the type of content that would be featured in the show.” So, what changed? That remains unclear, but a PG version of the show with a 30-year-old Lizzie seems like a terrible idea. And the fact that Disney doesn’t seem to be clear on who the target audience is for these revivals is troublesome. Are they appealing to a new generation of kids to suddenly watch the sequel to a ‘90s show they have to connection to? Or are they appealing to the generation of fans who grew up with the character and are now at a different stage in life? Whatever it is, they better decide quickly before they ruin that “The Proud Family” revival.
Here’s Duff’s statement: