- For the title character, see Lizzie McGuire .
Lizzie McGuire is a
Disney Channel Original Series
that aired on the
Disney Channel from
2001 until 2004. Its target
demographic
was
preteens and
adolescents. The
TV show
was created by
Terri Minsky. The show's
creatively offbeat, mixed media format stood out from the rest of
the Disney Channel's programming of the time and, in essence,
became the channel's
flagship and definitive show of
the early 2000s. The show's producer
Stan
Rogow says the visual look of the show was partly inspired by
Run Lola Run. Production was
completed in 2002 after the show fulfilled its 65 episode
order.
Characters
Main characters
- Lizzie
McGuire (Hilary Duff):
Lizzie is the main character of the show. She is portrayed a fun
teen although her animated alter ego
displays her true feelings from time to time including becoming
rebellious, disrespectful and rude in the episode "Bad Girl
McGuire". Lizzie constantly gets into arguments with her younger
brother Matt but is well-aware of what is right and wrong.
- Miranda Sanchez
(Lalaine): Miranda is one of Lizzie's best
friends; She, Lizzie, and Gordo form the main triumvirate. Miranda
is the most self-conscious of the three as is evident in an episode
in which she skips meals to get an "anorexic" look, but Lizzie and Gordo always see
through her crisis. Her family is Hispanic, but she speaks very
little Spanish. Miranda's middle name is revealed to be Isabella in
the episode, "Rated Aargh". She did not appear in the last six
episodes, nor in The Lizzie McGuire Movie. During this
time, her character was said to be vacationing with her family in
Mexico.
- Gordo (Adam Lamberg): Gordo is one of Lizzie's best
friends and has been since they were two days old. He usually
offers sarcasm and good advice. He is portrayed as being very
intelligent, practical, and he
is a "Straight A" student. He was revealed to be Jewish, as shown in one episode where he had a
Bar Mitzvah. In the episode "The
Untitled Stan Jenson Project," it was revealed that Lizzie had a
crush on him in the fourth grade. In The Lizzie McGuire
Movie, Gordo was pulled into a lip-lock with Lizzie after she
realizes what a big mistake she has made. In the episode "Dear
Lizzie", it is revealed that Gordo has a crush on Lizzie.
- Matt McGuire
(Jake Thomas): Matt is Lizzie's little
brother. As a stock character, he
was often destroying something. He had a best friend named Lanny,
who did not speak on-screen. Matt was clever and wily and had a
reputation for getting into trouble. Matt and Lizzie shared a
typical brother-sister relationship. They fooled around, annoyed
each other, but were always there for each other at the end of each
episode. He was rather intelligent and creative and knew how to
humor people. Matt's favourite color is Yellow.
- Jo McGuire (Hallie Todd): Jo is Lizzie and Matt's mother.
She cared deeply about Lizzie but was still trying to figure out
how to raise a teenager. As a result, she sometimes tended to "mess
up" situations in Lizzie's life while trying to help make them
better. At the end of each episode, Jo and Lizzie tend to come to
an understanding and portray the unfaltering love of a
mother-daughter relationship.
- Sam McGuire
(Robert Carradine): Sam is Lizzie
and Matt's father. He could be best described as a bit goofy and
quite clueless about raising his kids. However, he always tried his
best to help Lizzie out and understand her and was always available
to lend a helping hand.
Recurring characters
- Kate
Sanders/Saunders (Ashlie
Brillault): Kate was the most popular girl at Lizzie's school.
Originally one of Lizzie and Miranda's best friends, Kate became
popular because she got a bra after summer camp
was over; as a result of her new-found popularity, Kate became
Lizzie's enemy. Kate enjoyed trying to make Lizzie's life
miserable, but Lizzie always managed to outsmart Kate and come out
on top. References in episodes are inconsistent about her last
name. While Kate was mean to Lizzie in the series, she helps out
Lizzie in The Lizzie McGuire Movie.
- Ethan Craft
(Clayton Snyder): Ethan was the boy
who Lizzie, Miranda, and the rest of the girls at school had a huge
crush on. He did not appear to be very bright, but he was kind and
friendly to everyone. In season one, he was portrayed as more of a
bad boy or a class bully. For example, he used to force Gordo to do
things against his will.
- Larry Tudgeman
(Kyle Downes): Referred to as "Tudgeman"
(or simply Tudge), Larry was the school dork. He was treated like
an outcast by everyone except by Lizzie and her friends (with
exceptions). He also had been known to wear the same shirt since
the fourth grade. Larry had a huge crush on Lizzie (that she did
not return) and even asked her out to go to the science museum.
Lizzie accepted his invitation to make him feel liked.
- Claire Miller (Davida Williams): Claire was Kate's new best
friend. She was not very kind to Lizzie. She could sometimes even
be unkind to her friends, including Kate, as shown in the episode
"The Rise & Fall of The Kate Empire." She represented the
stereotypical popular girl portrayed on many TV shows.
- Lanny Onasis (Christian Copelin): Lanny was Matt's best
friend. He never spoke on-screen, but Matt seemed to have no
problem communicating with him. Apparently, he was a direct
descendant of Crispus Attucks.
- Melina Bianco (Carly Schroeder): Melina was initially
Matt's friend who loved getting Lanny and Matt into trouble. Later
in the series, they both began to have feelings for each
other.
- "Mr. Digg" Digby Sellers (Arvie Lowe Jr.): Mr. Digg was Lizzie's cool,
laid-back substitute teacher. In his lessons he often implied that
he had educated celebrities like Frankie
Muniz and Christina Aguilera.
He befriended Lizzie's dad in one of the episodes and dated Matt's
teacher, Miss Jasmine Chapman.
Minor characters
- Eduardo and Daniela Sanchez (Armando Molina
and Dyana Ortelli): They were Miranda's parents and appeared in a
few episodes, including one in which they played a prank on
Kate.
- Howard and Roberta Gordon (Michael Mantell and
Alison Martin): They were Gordo's parents, who were both
psychiatrists.
- Parker Mackenzie (Chelsea Wilson): Parker was a girl in
Lizzie's class. In an episode, Gordo had a crush on her. She was a
vegetarian, as shown in the episode "Obsession". In an episode,
Gordo asked Parker for a dance. She refused because in her opinion
he is too short for her. Parker disliked Lizzie because she sneezed
on her Macaroni Art in the 2nd grade and sat on her Titanic lunch
box in the 5th grade.
- Danny Kessler (Byron Fox): Danny was Lizzie
and Miranda's first heart-throb. He appeared in the first few
episodes. He was mentioned in the episode "My Fair Larry" and in
The Lizzie McGuire Movie.
- Veruca Albano (Rachel
Snow): She was a nerdy girl who appeared once in Season 1 and
more often in later seasons when Lizzie enters the eighth grade. In
"Dear Lizzie", she asks Lizzie for help with a bully problem, and
even confides to her that "nothing gets out goulash".
- Amy Sanders/Saunders (Haylie Duff): She was Kate's 18 year old cousin,
who acted like an older version of Kate. Plus, Kate and Amy had a
rocky relationship. In the episode "Party Over Here" when Amy first
appeared, Kate is shown to have a softer, slightly self-conscious
side.
- Coach Kelly (Dot
Jones): She was the gym teacher at Hillridge Junior High.
- Principal Tweedy (Phill
Lewis): He was the principal of Hillridge Junior High.
- Mr. Escobar (Daniel R. Escobar): He was a teacher at Hillridge
Junior High who taught Lizzie's class in junior grade.
- Jeremy and David: They are Sam's best friends
who own a pet chimp named Fredo. Lizzie also saved one of their
lives in "Rated Aargh!".
Animated Lizzie
Animated Lizzie was an animated character who
represented the title character's inner thoughts, addressing the
audience directly in the manner of a
Greek
chorus. The show was not the first series to use animation to
reflect a live-action character's innermost thoughts.
McGee and Me and
Student Bodies, two
syndicated program about the struggles of a
cartoonist for a
school
newspaper, often used the artist's
surrealistic caricatures of himself and his friends to
visually illustrate his interior
monologues. Animated Lizzie was voiced by series
star
Hilary Duff.
Spin-offs
The show was completed after 65 episodes, which was reportedly a
Disney policy for all of its series, although that has changed now
due to the popularity and success of
That's So Raven,
Kim Possible,
The Suite Life of Zack &
Cody, and
Hannah
Montana. Disney considered continuing the franchise in
further films and a prime-time television series with Lizzie,
Miranda and Gordo attending high school which was to be broadcast
on
ABC, but the plans
never took off because Duff's representatives claimed she was not
being paid enough for the proposed series.
Syndication
It was announced in late May 2006 that Superstation WGN (now
WGN America) would carry
Lizzie
McGuire and
Even Stevens
in
syndication; this began on
September 18,
2006.
As a result, Disney Channel stopped airing both shows except for
their holiday episodes, but Disney Channel began airing reruns of
Lizzie McGuire in a multi-episode blocks two afternoons
each week on
September 12,
2009, thus making it the first Disney Channel series to
air between 1998 and 2002 to be added back on the schedule after
being removed from the channel's lineup. The first episodes to
re-air were Pool Party, Picture Day, Rumors, and I've Got Rhythmic
in that chronological order.
Episodes
| Season |
Ep # |
First Airdate |
Last Airdate |
| Season
1 |
31 |
January 12, 2001 |
January 18, 2002 |
| Season
2 |
34 |
February 8, 2002 |
February 14, 2004 |
|
Film
A movie based on the show,
The Lizzie McGuire Movie,
debuted on May 2, 2003 at number two at the box office behind
X2: X-Men United. It earned $42.7
million at the US box office and eventually grossed $55.6 million
worldwide. It received mixed reviews with one critic calling it,
"an unabashed promotion of Duff’s image, just as
Crossroads was for
Spears". Other reviews were generally
positive and encouraging.
Merchandising
The character of Lizzie continues to be merchandised by Disney,
especially through a large set of
Lizzie McGuire books, which include
novelizations of the episodes, original
Nancy
Drew-style stories in the Lizzie McGuire Mysteries series, and
"Cine-manga" pictorial adaptations (published by
TOKYOPOP) with still shots from the show presented
in
manga style.
A Lizzie McGuire
doll was released in
2002 by Dakin Toys. The 10" doll featured many of Lizzie's outfits.
A
plush doll of the Cartoon Lizzie was made by
Dakin in 2002.
Fortune magazine
estimated in 2003 that Lizzie McGuire merchandise had earned the
Walt Disney Co. nearly $100 million. In the show's heyday, Radio
Disney continually promoted Lizzie McGuire and regularly gave away
the show's CD.
The Volume One DVD set of
Lizzie
McGuire.
The only full-length DVD release to date, in the U.S.
Several home video and DVD versions of the show have been released
in various countries.
In the United States
, some thematic episode collections were first
released and later a DVD box set consisting of 22 episodes from the
first season (mostly, but not entirely, corresponding to the first
22 episodes in production order). It is designated as
"Volume 1", but no plans are known for the release of volumes 2 and
3 of the series, and poor sales of the first box set may prevent
further releases.
As of April 2006, a box set of 12 DVDs with
all the 65 episodes of the show is available in Spain
, and box
sets (grouped into three 22-episode "seasons") Ireland
TG4 are available in Australia
and the UK
.
Lizzie-themed toys were included in a 2004
McDonald's Happy Meal
series, which included
CD-ROM discs
containing Lizzie-related games and graphics and audio versions of
Lizzie (not voiced by Duff) reading stories based on episode plots
of her show.
There is a Lizzie McGuire bedroom set offered by furniture stores
as one of several Disney-themed children's bedrooms and a
What
Would Lizzie Do? board game where players must judge Lizzie's
likely response to various situations. Three
Lizzie
McGuire video games have been released for the
Game Boy Advance:
Lizzie McGuire: On
the Go (2003),
Lizzie McGuire 2: Lizzie Diaries
(2004), and
Lizzie McGuire 3: Homecoming Havoc
(2005).
Both seasons of Lizzie McGuire are now available on
iTunes.
DVD releases
In pop culture
- In Triumph, the Insult
Comic Dog's song "I Keed", there's a reference to Fred Durst
checking out the cast of Lizzie McGuire: "And yet you're too old
for Fred Durst to desire, he's checking
out the cast of Lizzie McGuire"
See also
References
- Lizzie McGuire episode list at the Internet Movie
Database
- 'Disney's 'Tween Machine: How the Disney Channel
became must-see TV--and the company's unlikely cash cow.'
Fortune, 2003-09-29, accessed 2009-04-19
External links
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