Like many stage adaptations of stage musicals, Mean girls (2024) does not include all the songs from the Broadway version. After all, the musical is two and a half hours long, which wouldn’t translate well into a light-hearted, snappy movie. Directors Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. had to cut back.
Some of the film’s embellishments work. Many of the songs inserted are revivals, or songs that heavily feature protagonist Cady Heron, but Angourie Rice, who plays Cady in the 2024 film, does not have the voice for those songs. (Case in point: Jaquel Spivey as Damian takes over her rising, strap-heavy role in “Apex predator.”) Some of the nicer songs were cut, like “Meet the Plastics.” In the movie, it’s just an intro for the mean girl Regina George (Reneé Rapp). But the original version features a unique intro for each member of her clique, which helps solidify their distinctive, hilarious personalities. However, few of those pairings have any real impact on the plot.
Except for one crucial moment.
In the Broadway musical, Damian leads a song called “Stop,” in which he calls out Cady for turning into Regina. He tries to get Cady to put the brakes on the mega-bitch persona she’s come to adopt, now that her project to infiltrate the Plastics by pretending to become one of them is no longer pretending. It’s a fun song for Damian (and seeing Spivey tap dance would have been a great moment in the movie), but it also provides important context for Cady’s character development.
The new Mean girls doesn’t really do enough to hammer Cady’s heel turn into the new Regina. That’s a key part of the original film, where Lindsay Lohan’s voiceover helps sell Cady’s increasing obsession with Regina and taking over her lifestyle. In Mean girls (2024), the change is surprisingly abrupt. Immediately following Regina’s very public fall (physical and metaphorical) at the winter talent show, Cady becomes the center of attention on social media. In the next scene, she is getting ready in class, ignoring her friends in homeroom, and lying about weekend plans to her mother.
Technically, her change takes place after winter break and she has had some off-screen time to adjust to her new status. But this selfish, status-obsessed version of Cady feels like a huge leap, while her previous issue was mostly just her wide-eyed, timid and pushed around by everyone else. There are three whole songs in the musical And a pause before she becomes the new Regina so that the passage of time becomes clearer. Rice’s Cady doesn’t get a slow escalation or a clear break. She suddenly goes from a wide-eyed ingénue, who can barely stomach the idea of revenge, to someone who fake cries in front of her mother so she can get out of a planned mother-daughter trip and throw a tantrum in the absence of mother.
Photo: Jojo Whilden/Paramount Pictures
Keeping “Stop” in the film version would have emphasized Cady’s evolution. It’s not the slow escalation of obsessive thoughts from the original film, or the clear passage of time in the Broadway musical, but it would emphasize Cady’s actions and reiterate that her attitude has been evolving for quite some time. Cady’s bow is the key to Mean girlsbecause it shows how easily even the best-intentioned people can get caught up in revenge and the pursuit of popularity.
And the speed of her change undermines the impact when she pulls out. The turning point where Cady finally decides to just be herself and go to the math tournament, and then celebrates all her peers at school – not just the popular ones – doesn’t have as much impact if we don’t see Cady accept the allure of the Plastic lifestyle first .
Besides the ways in which “Stop” helps advance the plot, it’s just a good song for Damian! His other big song, “Where do you belong?” Also did not cut the film. (It’s not super plot-relevant, so that’s fine.) But even though Spivey gets Cady’s role in “Apex Predator,” “Stop” would be a better showcase of his comedic chops and his impressive singing. Spivey’s take on Damian is one of the best parts of the film, and keeping this song could have been a chance for him to shine.