20 Years On, Clueless Almost Didn’t Get Made

It was the movie that was a slow burner upon release but gradually sunk its way into pop culture to become a nineties cult classic. ?It’s still famous to a new generation nowadays, partly thanks to an Iggy Azalea’s ‘Fancy’ music video, which we couldn’t help but like. It was a teen movie that was fun, fashion forward (like, way beyond its time) and nowadays it is fondly remembered as a true classic of teen movies. They don’t make ?em like it anymore. ?As the film celebrates its 20th anniversary this week (we can’t believe it either), the writer/director spoke about the film and revealed a few facts about the now beloved flick.

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The film almost didn’t get made. Why? Because it was considered too ?female orientated.? How typical. According to The Telegraph, when writer/director Amy Heckerling first shopped the script around, it was met by much of the same gender-based pushback that still plagues movie making today. Thank God Paramount saw sense and picked it up.

?I was asked by Fox’s TV department to pitch them an idea. They said, ?We want you to do something about young people. I had always been interested in a character who is extremely optimistic, and what it would be like to be the kind of person who didn’t have any self-doubt,? said Heckerling. Hence, Cher was born.

And how did she think of her heroine’s name? ?It was 1995, so Cher was 15 going on 16, she was born in 1980, which meant her mother was a teenager in the late Sixties. She would have looked to the famous women then and thought, “I’m going to have a daughter named Cher?. Genius.

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Alicia Silverstone was also known as the ?Areosmith Girl? pre Clueless (remember the music video with Liv Tyler?) and actor Paul Rudd (who plays Cher’s ex-stepbrother/love interest Josh) said he was majorly excited to be starring in ?a movie with ?The Aerosmith Girl.? It was also a big film for Brittney Murphy, who suffered an untimely death in 2009. RIP Brittney. We loved her in the movie. In fact, we love the whole thing. And we STILL can’t believe it is 20 years later and we’re still talking about it. We feel way old, but whatever?

Telegraph

@Jenny_McShane

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