Regina George: Mean Girl or Hidden Queer Icon?
By Anna Buescher
All Mean Girls lovers are anxiously awaiting the “Mean Girls the Musical” movie. All Reneé Rapp lovers are even more aware of her exciting new role as Regina George. Back in 2019 the famed artist took over the role of Regina George from Taylor Louderman in the Broadway production of Mean Girls the Musical. She stunned the audience with her incredible vocal talent during Regina’s three songs “Meet the Plastics”, “Someone Gets Hurt”, and “World Burn”. When Rapp took over the role June 7th, 2019, it was for a limited time summer engagement, but she was set to take over the role full time that September 10th. Unfortunately, the Covid-19 pandemic put an abrupt pause on her promising Broadway career. During this pause Reneé built her music into the empire it has become today. Now with the revamp of Mean Girls the musical in its exciting new movie format, Reneé has been offered a chance to really explode her acting career, but what does an on-screen Reneé Rapp/Regina George entail?
Reneé Rapp will be the first openly gay actress to portray Regina George and this brings forth a lot of new interpretations on this Queen Bee. Being played by a gay actor opens up a box full of new ways to interpret a character. Reading into Regina George as a closeted queer going through High School puts a new spin on this classic “mean girl”. When we look at her actions with a background of her closeting and hiding her queerness back in the early 2000’s it sheds light on possible motivation behind her sassy, cruel actions. In the early 2000s very few people came out in high school. This is even talked about in the movie. Regina George started a rumor that Janice Ian was a lesbian which caused the young artsy character to become a loner. Looking at this storyline through a queer lens makes the action less of a Mean Girl move and more a Scared Closeted attack. I should clarify that turning Regina George into a queer character in no way justifies her actions as a Plastic, but instead adds layers to her character making her a more well rounded and realistic person.
Reading into Regina George as a closeted queer character may fully depend on Reneé Rapp’s portrayal of Regina. While Reneé Rapp’s open bisexuality adds a sprinkle of queerness into Regina George as a character, Rapp has a choice to lean into making Regina George queer, or portraying the character as the original interpretation. It will be quite interesting to watch the new movie, which will be released January 12, 2024. I am excited to see how Reneé Rapp decides to portray this iconic character. What will she add to Regina George? What will she change?
I encourage anyone planning to watch the new Mean Girls the Musical to watch this classic theater with their eyes peeled for Reneé Rapp’s interpretation of Regina George and how the movie changes due to her new interpretation of this iconic character. How will the Queen of the Plastics change with an understated queerness?
About the Author
Anna Buescher is a current junior at Butler university studying Biology and French. She uses she/they pronouns and identifies as a queer woman. She is passionate about LGBTQ+ rights, climate change, fungi and much much more. You can reach out to her at abuescher@butler.edu.
