Hilary Duff Says She Can't Picture Lizzie McGuire at 40 Years Old — But Maybe 55 or 60
The long-running saga of the Lizzie McGuire reboot has reached what may be its final chapter.
Hilary Duff, the 38-year-old star who made the Disney Channel character a millennial touchstone, has effectively closed the door on a revival — for now, at least.
And this time, the reason has less to do with creative disagreements or studio politics than with her own professional trajectory moving decisively toward music.
Duff appeared on the March 9 episode of the On Purpose with Jay Shetty podcast, where she addressed the question head-on.
“I can say that, right now, it’s not in the cards,” she said, alluding to her busy schedule. “I have a world tour to go on and that’s going to take me a few years, I think.”
A multi-year touring commitment functionally takes any revival off the table for the immediate future.
She went on to say that she was always “really excited” to think about Lizzie in her 30s “and going through 30-year-old things,” but now she “can’t really see her at 40.”
“Maybe I could start to see her around 55 (or) 60, and I think that’s interesting,” she added.
From D23 Hype to Sudden Cancellation
Lizzie McGuire ran for 65 episodes on Disney Channel from 2001 to 2004. The franchise also included The Lizzie McGuire Movie, released in 2003.
Both properties helped establish Duff as one of Disney Channel’s signature stars and turned the character into durable IP with a built-in millennial fanbase.
An earlier attempt to extend the franchise had already failed. After the original run, Disney wanted to transition the show into an ABC spinoff following Lizzie into high school, but that effort fell through.
The bigger attempt came in 2019. At the D23 Expo, Disney revealed that Duff was in talks to reprise her role for a show about Lizzie McGuire in her 30s on Disney+, with original creator Terri Minski returning as showrunner.
Having both the original star and original creator attached gave the project significant credibility with the target audience and fit Disney’s early Disney+ strategy of leveraging beloved catalog IP to drive subscriber growth.
The series lasted two episodes before being canceled in 2020. Duff announced the cancellation in an Instagram post on Dec. 16, 2020.
Making Peace with Lizzie McGuire
During a March 3 appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show, Duff revealed that it took a solid decade to “make peace” with her Lizzie McGuire character.
“It’s weird to play a character that people fall so in love with that doesn’t grow up. She stays that age and then I grew up,” she told Barrymore.
That tension — between a frozen-in-time character and a living, evolving performer — is one of the fundamental challenges of the nostalgia revival model. Audiences want the character they remember. Talent wants to grow.
Bridging that gap is precisely what the 2019 Disney+ revival was designed to do, and its failure speaks to the difficulty of the task.
Duff went on to say that the end of her Lizzie era drove her toward music.
“I think that was why I wanted to be a pop star. The second I finished filming Lizzie, I was like, ‘Cool, I don’t want to be called that anymore,” she said.
Now, the dynamic has shifted. Duff said she’s “obsessed” with Lizzie.
“I get to join the fandom and be excited like everybody else, even though I was her,” Duff said. “But for a while, it was a hard thing to be changing and evolving, but everywhere I went I was this to people.”
Lizzie Still Lives Rent-Free in Duff’s Head
Despite the business complications and two failed revival attempts, Duff’s relationship with the character appears to have settled into a warm place.
On Shetty’s podcast, Duff did a would you rather round that captured the dynamic.
“Would you rather have to say, ‘Hi, I’m Hilary Duff and you’re watching Disney Channel,’ every time you introduce yourself or have the Lizzie McGuire animated character in your head at all times?” Shetty asked.
“Oh, she lives in there rent-free baby,” Duff replied. “I think I would have her living — I mean, I’ve accepted her in my head, so I’m choosing the latter,” she added.
Production of this article included the use of AI. It was reviewed and edited by a team of content specialists.
