Daniel Franzese is an American actor best known for his roles in the films Bully and Mean Girls. Franzese is the creator of several live comedy shows, including the 2011 rock opera Jersey Shoresical: A Frickin' Rock Opera! and his one-man stand-up performance I've Never Really Made the Kind of Money to Become a Mess in 2013.
Janis Ian, also referred to as Janis Sarkisian or Janis ʻImiʻike in the musical versions, is a character from the Mean Girls franchise.
Cady Heron is a fictional character and the main protagonist of the 2004 film Mean Girls and its musical counterpart. She is portrayed by Lindsay Lohan in the original 2004 film, Erika Henningsen in its Broadway musical version and by Angourie Rice in its 2024 musical film.
Mean Girls is a 2004 American teen comedy film directed by Mark Waters and written by Tina Fey. It stars Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams, Lacey Chabert, and Amanda Seyfried. The film follows Cady Heron (Lohan), a naïve teenager who transfers to an American high school after years of homeschooling in Africa. Heron quickly befriends two outcasts, with the trio forming a plan to exact revenge on Regina George (McAdams), the leader of an envied clique known as the Plastics.
Queerbaiting is a marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but do not depict, same-sex romance or other LGBTQ+ representation. The purpose of this method is to attract ("bait") a queer or straight ally audience with the suggestion or possibility of relationships or characters that appeal to them, while not alienating homophobic members of the audience or censors by actually portraying queer relationships.
America Chavez is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer Joe Casey and artist Nick Dragotta, the character first appeared in Vengeance #1. America Chavez is a lesbian superhero of Latin-American origin. She has assumed the mantle of Miss America from the superheroine Madeline Joyce. She has also been a member of the A-Force, the Ultimates, and the Young Avengers at various points in her history.
Angourie Isabel Teresa Rice is an Australian actress. She began her career as a child actress, coming to attention for her roles in These Final Hours (2013) and The Nice Guys (2016). She played Betty Brant in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, appearing in Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019), and Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021). For her starring role in Ladies in Black (2018), she won the AACTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role. In 2024, she starred as Cady Heron in the musical film Mean Girls.
Mean Girls is a musical with a book by Tina Fey, lyrics by Nell Benjamin, and music by Jeff Richmond. It is based on the 2004 Mark Waters film of the same name, which was also written by Fey and was in-turn inspired by Rosalind Wiseman's 2002 book Queen Bees and Wannabes. The musical focuses on Cady Heron, a teenage girl who transfers to a public high school after being homeschooled her whole life in Africa. At school, she befriends outsiders Janis Sarkasian and Damian Hubbard who persuade her to infiltrate the "Plastics", a clique consisting of wealthy but insecure Gretchen Wieners, sweet but dimwitted Karen Smith, and "queen bee" Regina George.
Queer coding involves attributing stereotypically queer traits without explicitly stating gender and sexual identity. Though such a character's sexual identity may not be explicitly confirmed within their respective work, a character might be coded as queer through the use of traits and stereotypes recognizable to the audience. Queer coding is a concept both in the discussion of media portrayal of LGBT people and academic research involving queer theory or gender studies.
For many years, LGBT representation increased on animated series and animated films. In the 1990s, LGBT characters were depicted in animated series like South Park, The Ambiguously Gay Duo, and The Simpsons. In the early 2000s, LGBT representation increased in Western animation, culminating in GLAAD's "Where We Are in TV" report in 2005, even as representation in such animation was scattered and disparate. In the 2000s, series like Queer Duck, The Oblongs, The Venture Bros., Drawn Together, and Archer would air. It would not be until the advent of shows like Steven Universe, The Legend of Korra, and Adventure Time in the 2010s, that LGBT characters in animation would gain more of a prominent role, leading to shows such as She-Ra and the Princesses of Power in 2018 and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts in 2020, along with other series in the 2020s. This page will show this progress by building off the lists of animated series which contain these characters and explain the History of LGBT characters in animation. It does not focus on LGBT characters in anime series or films, which is examined on the LGBT themes in anime and manga page.
This article features the history of the representation of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) characters in animated productions under The Walt Disney Company, including films from the studios Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar, and programming from the Disney Branded Television channels as well as the streaming service Disney+. From 1983 onward, Disney struggled with LGBTQ representation in their animated series, and their content often included LGBT stereotypes or the content was censored in series such as Blazing Dragons. Some creators have also criticized Disney studio executives of cutting LGBTQ scenes from their shows in the past, or criticized that their shows were not seen as part of the "Disney brand", like The Owl House.
Mean Girls is a 2024 American teen musical comedy film directed by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. from a screenplay by Tina Fey. It is based on the stage musical of the same name, which in turn was inspired by the 2004 film of the same name, both written by Fey, and based on the 2002 book Queen Bees and Wannabes by Rosalind Wiseman. It stars Angourie Rice, Reneé Rapp, Auliʻi Cravalho, and Christopher Briney. Fey and Tim Meadows reprise their roles from the original film.
Jaquel Spivey is an American actor. He won a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Musical and received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Musical for his starring role as Usher in the Broadway theatre production of A Strange Loop in 2022. He also earned a Grammy Award nomination for the cast recording of the show.
Mean Girls (Music from the Motion Picture) is the soundtrack album to the 2024 film adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name. The album was released on January 12, 2024, by Interscope Records.
