Why teenage Hilary Duff was scared of ‘mean’ A-list co-star in A Cinderella Story

Former child star Hilary Duff reveals she felt so intimidated when her A-list co-star was continuously “mean” to her on the set of this cult classic.

Hilary Duff was intimidated by Jennifer Coolidge while working on the 2004 movie A Cinderella Story together.

The Lizzie McGuire star reminisced about working with the American Pie actress and how Coolidge got into character as Fiona, the wicked stepmother of Duff’s character, Sam, in the modernisation of the classic fairy tale.

“By the way, it’s just so much fun to watch her career,” Duff, 38, told Variety of the Emmy-winning actress. “She just goes there in such a big way that it was really impressive and slightly intimidating as a teenager.”

Hilary Duff admitted she was intimidated working on 2004’s A Cinderella Story with Jennifer Coolidge, who played her evil stepmother. Picture: ©Warner Bros

Duff, who was just 15 at the time, said Coolidge was “mean to me” and “a little scary”. Picture: ©Warner Bros

“And she was mean to me, so it was a little scary, ’cause I was only like 15 and she was just, you know, mean to me ’cause she’s my evil stepmother,” she recalled.

Duff admitted Coolidge, 64, was so good in character that it made her uncomfortable.

“At the time, I was like …,” Duff said, recalling taking deep breaths. “I had to be like, ‘You’re filming a movie. You’re filming a movie.’”

Coolidge’s rep didn’t immediately respond to Page Six’s request for comment on Duff’s remarks.

The former child star said she had to remind herself that it was only a movie. Picture: ©Warner Bros

Directed by Mark Rosman, A Cinderella Story also starred Chad Michael Murray as Duff’s love interest, Austin, and Regina King as Rhonda, Sam’s fairy godmother.

The movie was a commercial success and inspired multiple straight-to-video films.

Coolidge films a scene with Regina King, who plays the fairy godmother. Picture: ©Warner Bros

Murray, 44, shared his idea for a sequel to the film in an interview with Parade in July. The original ending saw Austin and Sam going off to Princeton together.

“I think the way that I would do it would be, as love does in high school, it doesn’t work out,” he said. “Most of the time, they’ve gone separate ways. They’ve had their lives.”

The movie also starred Chad Michael Murray as Austin, the love interest of Duff’s character. Picture : ©Warner Bros

“Maybe my character would be a teacher at this point, an English teacher back at the school, and maybe Hilary Duff’s character got married, had kids [and] it didn’t work out,” he continued.

“And now her daughter happens to be in my class, and you do a dual Cinderella story, where she’s a little shy, and she maybe doesn’t fit in. And [my character] nurtures that. And blah, blah, blah. I think that would be something to tell.”

Murray also shared why he thinks the film has stood the test of time.

“Still today, young girls are watching it all the time, and every time it’s on, I’m sitting there going, ‘You know what? They did a great job with this film. Hats off to everybody that was a part of this film,’” he shared. “They did a great job.”

This article originally appeared in Page Six and was reproduced with permission

Originally published as Why teenage Hilary Duff was scared of ‘mean’ A-list co-star in A Cinderella Story