'Mean Girls': New Movie Shifts From Paramount+ With Theatrical Release

Mean Girls is moving. Despite the plans for a Paramount+ debut, the new movie musical is now releasing in theaters, Deadline first reported. It will be released on Jan. 12, 2024, during the MLK 4-day holiday weekend. The outlet stated that the film will be publicized heavily, and there will be a huge marketing push to promote it. This will be Paramount's second time moving a Paramount+ release to the big screen in recent history, the last time being with the big smash Smile in the fall of last year.

The movie, based on a musical adaptation of the 2004 hit film, is written by Fey and directed by Arturo Perez and Samantha Jayne. The ensemble cast includes Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Auli'i Cravalho, Jaquel Spivey, Tina Fey, Tim Meadows, Jenna Fischer, Busy Philipps, Avantika, Christopher Briney, and Bebe Wood.

The upcoming film adaptation was also reported to star Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Lacey Chabert, and Amanda Seyfried from the original 2004 movie — but talks with the actors have allegedly stalled. During a February appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers, Fey joked about reprising her role as teacher Ms. Norbury, "Teachers work forever. I want it to be like when Gilligan from Gilligan's Island would be at a trade show, and you'd be like, 'Oh, he looks so old in his little hat.' That's my goal."

In response to Meyers' question about whether the musical score in the film would change, she said, "The songs are sounding really more kinda pop. In Broadway, everything has to play to the back of the house and in movies, everything can come back in and things can play really intimately."

Mean Girls had its world premiere run at the National Theatre in Washington D.C. in 2017 before opening on April 8, 2018. "We remain excited to bring this musical to the big screen, relaunch the tour, and prepare for a London production," said Lorne Michaels at the time, who is also producing the movie musical. At the end of its Broadway run, the musical grossed $124 million. It closed on March 11 after 805 performances and 29 previews at Broadway's August Wilson Theatre. 

The original Mean Girls movie, directed by Mark Waters and penned by Fey off of Rosalind Wiseman's novel, grossed over $130M worldwide and launched the careers of Rachel McAdams and Amanda Seyfried while also repping a box office hit for Lindsay Lohan at the time.