Key Points
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Lindsay Lohan and Jamie Lee Curtis reunite for EW’s Freakier Friday cover story.
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Curtis says the movie wouldn’t work if Lohan wasn’t old enough to play a mom.
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Lohan says the film felt “special” because she’s “never played a mom before on screen.”
Lindsay Lohan has famously played a nun with a gun, the owner of a sentient car, and a soul-swapping teen across her Hollywood filmography, but one thing she hadn’t yet portrayed until her long-awaited onscreen reunion with Jamie Lee Curtis in Freakier Friday? A mom!
As the producer-stars of the upcoming sequel tell Entertainment Weekly for our “Behind the Cover” video (above) for our latest cover story, they were eager to continue the story of Tess (Curtis) and Anna (Lohan) Coleman in the long-gestating sequel to their 2003 comedy hit. But, according to Curtis, it was important that “Lindsay was old enough to be the mother of a teenager” in order to push the story in new directions.
“It wouldn’t work if Lindsay was playing the mom of a 15-year-old, but the math didn’t add up,” the Oscar winner, 66, explains. “Believe it or not, I actually did math. Her age, minus 15, it was like, ‘Oh, it’ll work!’ Then, I happened to call the studio.”
She’s not kidding. As Curtis recalls in a separate interview, “In every country I went to [promote Halloween Ends], the only consistent question I got was ‘When are you making another Freaky Friday?’” She then called Lohan while the latter was filming her 2024 Netflix comedy Irish Wish in Europe, before contacting Disney boss Bob Iger to get the project off the ground.
In addition to logistics, Lohan also brought a new sensibility as a mom to a grown-up version of Anna, who, in the first film, swaps souls with her mother thanks to a mystic curse.
In the sequel, she’s about to marry British restauranteur Eric (Manny Jacinto), whose daughter, Lily (Sophia Hammons) harbors deep disdain for Anna’s child, Harper (Julia Butters), amid their new blended family.
Not only is Freakier Friday one of Lohan’s first movies as a new mother to 21-month-old son Luai, but she feels it holds a special place in her heart because it’s the star’s first onscreen role as a mother, too.
“I played one in Labor Pains for a second at the very end, but you didn’t see it,” she recalls of her 2009 comedy. “I’ve never played a mom before on onscreen, so it’s special to me.”
Curtis, a mother of two, felt the magic of the moment, so she gifted Lohan with a commemorative piece of jewelry for the production.
“The necklace I’m wearing, which I also gave to Lindsay, has our children’s names engraved on the back, I wear it in the movie,” Lohan reveals. “It’s the first time I’ve ever worn something of mine as Tess.”
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Lohan also notes that, at this stage of her career following a major Hollywood comeback, choosing roles is a selective process — not only because of the types of parts she wants to play, but they also have to “work for my family,” she explains.
“If something works around that, it’s meant to happen. If it doesn’t work around that, it’s a no-go,” Lohan observes. Adds Curtis: “I had a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old at home, with three days of prep before the original Freaky Friday. If it filmed outside California, I wouldn’t have been in the movie. If it shot in Vancouver, I wouldn’t have done it, because I had kids. Balancing motherhood is a big part of our lives, but it’s also a big part of the movie. It’s the story of the movie.”
Freakier Friday is in theaters Aug. 8. Watch EW’s exclusive video interview with Lohan and Curtis in the video at the top of this post.
Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly
