“I’m a little resentful,” the actress said
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(745x329:747x331):format(webp)/Amanda-Seyfried-mean-girls-bunny-ears-Long-Bright-River-event-2025-060925-83e347e06e5740d1a7705eea3a45a637.jpg)
NEED TO KNOW
- Amanda Seyfried alleges Paramount Pictures has not paid her for using her “likeness” on Mean Girls merchandise
- “Is it because I was 17 and dumb?” Seyfried asked
- The actress starred as the ditzy Karen Smith in the 2004 teen comedy
Amanda Seyfried is calling out Paramount Pictures for allegedly making bank on Mean Girls merch without her.
The actress reminisced about the film — and the merch that’s been sold for it — during a recent conversation with Adam Brody, 45, for a new Actors on Actors segment for Variety.
The conversation, shared on X Monday, June 9, began with Brody asking Seyfried if she’s rewatched the 2004 cult classic comedy.
“No, I haven’t. It’s on often enough, though. And you know what? I love it,” she said, briefly pausing to find her thoughts.
“I really love seeing my face on people’s T-shirts,” Seyfried said. “I mean, I’m a little resentful because Paramount still owes me some money.”
Her response seemed to catch Brody by surprise.
“For the T-shirts?” the Nobody Wants This actor asked.
“For the likeness,” Seyfried replied.
According to the Long Bright River star, “Every store sells Mean Girls T-shirts with our faces on [them]. Photographs!”
She tried to rationalize what could have been the reason for her allegedly missing out on the money. “Is it because I was 17 and dumb?” Seyfried asked Brody.
Still, despite her contract with the film company, the Mama Mia alum is grateful to those who still support her and her costars — Lindsay Lohan, Rachel McAdams and Lacey Chabert in the Tina Fey-penned film.
“I love it!” Seyfried continued, recalling a recent encounter with “the girl at TSA” who told the star that Mean Girls was her “favorite movie.”
“I’m like, ‘Great, I was seven [teen], I had nothing to do with it,’” she said.
Paramount Pictures did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
In the 2004 film, Lohan, now 38, starred as Cady Heron, a transfer student from Africa living in the suburbs of Illinois as her new high school’s social outcast.
There, she meets teen queen bees Karen Smith (Seyfried), Gretchen Wieners (Chabert), and their leader Regina George (McAdams) — the trio fiercely known as The Plastics.
Seyfried played into the “dumb blonde” stereotype and was known for her ditzy reactions to just about everything in the film.
“It was sort of like, channeling a little bit of Some Like It Hot, Marilyn Monroe,” she told GQ in a March 20 video as she looked back on some of her most iconic roles. “I just held onto that so tight, because I felt like that was the reason I got the role, and I didn’t trust my instincts so much as having a clear idea of who I thought this person was.”
In October 2023, the leading ladies had a mini reunion (minus Rachel McAdams, 46) when the three actresses were spotted with camera crews on a football field in Los Angeles.
Photos showed them all with nods to their original characters, such as Lohan carrying a small zipped pouch that read “Plastics Club Member.” The actresses later starred in a Walmart commercial together.