‘Mean Girls’: Avantika, Christopher Briney & Bebe Wood Board Paramount Film Based On Tony-Nominated Musical Adaptation

EXCLUSIVE: Avantika (Senior Year), Christopher Briney (The Summer I Turned Pretty) and Bebe Wood (Love, Victor) have landed major roles in Paramount Pictures’ film adaptation of the Tony-nominated Broadway hit, Mean Girls, which is itself based on the classic Paramount comedy of the same name.

The actors join an ensemble for the Paramount+-bound feature that also includes Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Auli’i Cravalho and Jaquel Spivey, as previously announced.

The original film adapted by Tina Fey from the Rosalind Wiseman book Queen Bees and Wannabes follows high school new girl Cady Heron (Lindsay Lohan) in her attempt to fit in with A-list girl clique, The Plastics. The effort is sabotaged when she makes the mistake of falling for Aaron, the ex-boyfriend of alpha Plastic Regina George. Premiering on stage at Washington, D.C.’s National Theatre in 2017 and jumping to Broadway the following year, the Mean Girls musical was also written by Fey, with music by Jeff Richmond and lyrics by Nell Benjamin.

The new film, starring Rice as Cady, will have Avantika and Wood playing Regina’s Plastics cohorts Karen and Gretchen, with Briney as Aaron. 

Arturo Perez and Samantha Jayne are directing from a script by Fey, with Kyle Hanagami choreographing. Broadway Video founder Lorne Michaels is returning to produce alongside Fey, having backed the original film. Erin David, Caroline Maroney and Micah Frank are overseeing for Broadway Video, and Eric Gurian and Jeff Richmond for Little Stranger.

Avantika most recently wrapped major roles in the Screen Gems horror Horrorscope, from filmmakers Anna Halberg and Spenser Cohen, and the Prime Video series, Masoom. She became the first Indian American lead of a Disney Channel Original Movie with 2021’s Spin and also previously starred opposite Rebel Wilson in the Paramount-produced comedy Senior Year, which was the #1 movie globally on Netflix when it released last May. Avantika is currently developing a series adaptation of the New York Times bestseller A Crown of Wishes, with plans to exec produce and star.

Briney is best known for his role as Conrad Fisher in Amazon’s hit series The Summer I Turned Pretty, which returns for its second season this year. The actor recently made his film debut starring opposite Sir Ben Kingsley in the Mary Harron drama, Daliland.

Wood most recently starred in Hulu’s hit YA dramedy series Love, Victor and has also been seen on such series as The Real O’Neals (ABC), The New Normal (Fox), 30 Rock (NBC), See Dad Run (Nick at Nite), Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp (Netflix) and American Housewife (ABC), to name a few. Film credits include the indie Boy Genius with Black-ish‘s Miles Brown, Rita Wilson and Zach Gilford. The actress will next be seen on the Fox crime drama series, The Accused.

Mean Girls‘ choreographer Hanagami has choreographed for artists such as BlackPink, Jennifer Lopez, Britney Spears, CNCO, Justin Bieber and *NSYNC, also partnering with brands like Nike, Disney, Google, Netflix and Calvin Klein. He’s built an online empire off his viral dance videos, with his YouTube subscriber tally currently sitting at 4.5MM+ and his views across all platforms having passed 1 billion. He also holds the title for YouTube’s most viewed choreography video of all time, at more than 238MM views. Hanagami previously choreographed the Golden Globe and Academy Award-nominated Netflix animated feature Over the Moon, with Mean Girls to mark his first live-action feature.

Avantika is repped by Greene & Associates, ColorCreative, and Jackoway Austen Tyerman; Briney by CESD, Industry Entertainment and Peikoff Mahan; Wood by Gersh, Framework Entertainment and Meyer & Downs; and Hanagami by CAA and Podwall Entertainment.