Lizzie McGuire Forums

I heard ages ago hilary got mad at Disney and quit Lizzie McGuire because they weren't paying her enough, but know I've read Dick Cook from Disney Studios offered Duff a two-picture deal, including $3.5 million for a sequel plus a $500,000 bonus if The Lizzie McGuire Movie grossed $50 million. Hilary's mom Susan, said they wanted $5 million. She also wanted a producer credit for herself, and wanted Disney to pay her cell phone bills. Susan had a script for A Cinderella Story, which she shopped the project to every studio but Disney, and Cook was furious when he found out. He withdrew the two-picture offer, but negotiations for a sequel proceeded. Within three weeks, the gross for The Lizzie McGuire Movie at the box office had exceeded $40 million, and it seemed sure to pass the $50 million mark. Susan demanded Hilary's $500,000 bonus. Cook refused, she'd get the bonus when gross passed the target, and not before. But he reiterated the $4 million offer. Susan said she wanted $4.5.

Cook refused to budge, and gave her a deadline of May 8. The day came and went, and there was no word from Susan or Hilary's lawyer of manager. The next morning Susan called. "Okay, we'll take the deal." "You missed the deadline," Cook replied. That same day, Disney announced plans for a sequel had ended. "Disney thought they'd be able to bully us into accepting whatever offer they wanted to make, and they couldn't," Susan told Entertainment Weekly. "We walked away from a sequel. They walked away from a franchise." Roy Disney thought that Susan Duff had a point. There were also plans for a Lizzie McGuire series on Disney's ABC network, which would chart Lizzie's course through high school. This is how her mom Susan became enemies with Disney. Although, Hilary still has a contract with Disney's Hollywood Records which releases her albums.

Do you think Hilary's mom made the right decision? Strangley, I think she's sort of did. If Hilary was still playing Lizzie McGuire right now, nobody would think of her as anybody else. Also, she's now made a big name for herself in Music and movies. What do you think?

It's called show business for a reason. It's a business.

It's hard to argue that the Duffs made a bad business decision when Hil has spent nearly every waking moment, since leaving Lizzie, raking in the dough on new projects. She reportedly has her own luxury yacht now.

Disney is notoriously cheap. I saw a special that went behind the scenes of the Disney produced show, "Home Improvement". Everyone but Tim Allen had to fight for decent pay. When the child actors would ask for more money, Disney would hold fake auditions for replacement kids, just to scare the young actors into thinking they were expendable.

One more Disney note. Susan Estelle Jansen was the Disney producer for LM (Stan Rogow was an independent producer) and was instrumental in the Duff negotiations. In a recent interview I heard her say that when she saw the pilot episode, Pool Party, she thought it was terrible. I thought that episode was brilliant, it's still my favorite, and anyone with her reaction probably never had her head in the game when it came to LM.