By John Spinelli
ATLANTIC HIGHLANDS – It was a special night at Smodcastle Cinemas Jan. 12 for the opening of “Mean Girls,” filmed almost entirely in Middletown.
The movie musical hit No. 1 at the box office, bringing in $28 million in its first three days; $32 million including the MLK holiday. Based on the Broadway musical, itself based on the 2004 cult classic written by Tina Fey, the film was directed by Samantha Jayne and Arturo Perez Jr. with music by Fey’s husband, Jeff Richmond.
The movie stars Reneé Rapp as head “Plastic” Regina George, Angourie Rice as her frenemy Cady Heron, Aui’li Cravahlo as Janis, Jaquel Spivey as Damien, Avantika and Bebe Wood as fellow Plastics Karen and Gretchen, Christopher Briney as Aaron Samuels. The remake includes a cameo by Lindsay Lohan, star of the original movie.
But for many moviegoers from the Two River area, it wasn’t the stars they came to see on the big screen – it was their friends, neighbors, family members and, in some cases, even themselves. A special subset of attendees – those who graduated from Mater Dei Prep – showed up for the nostalgia. Most of the film was shot in the now-shuttered high school.
“It was surreal seeing myself on the big screen,” said Middletown resident Sean Molicki, a 2017 graduate of Mater Dei Prep. “I made so many friends on set and spent most of the time (while watching the movie) looking for us in the background.”
Molicki called filming in the building where he spent four years a “once-in-a-lifetime experience” but added that it was also “confusing.”
“I felt like I was back in high school, but I was actually working and in the presence of stars like Tina Fey and Reneé Rapp.”
In addition to Mater Dei Prep and the St. Mary School gymnasium, located on the same property, some scenes were filmed at private residences in the area. Principal photography took place in March and April of last year.
Middletown – and the greater Two River area – isn’t new to movie sets. In 2022, “Miranda’s Victim” filmed scenes in Red Bank and at Monmouth University. While Mater Dei Prep wasn’t used for filming that movie, during production the word got out to location scouts of the empty high school.
State filming incentives also helped make Middletown the perfect stand-in for suburban Illinois.
In one scene where Tina Fey’s character instructs the girls at the school to resolve their drama, all the actors portraying teachers in the scene – Malena Towers, Hank and Mimi Pekarsky, and Maria Peterson – are parishioners at St. Mary’s Church.
While Middletown native Peterson played a teacher in the film, she was once the cafeteria headmaster at Mater Dei Prep.
“Going into this I didn’t know what to expect,” Peterson said. “I randomly applied online for a background role and was called to be a background teacher.”
She said she had fun interacting with everyone on set, especially those she already knew from Mater Dei Prep, St. Mary’s and Middletown. “The directors, actors and actresses were wonderful,” she said, echoing the surprise of many locals at seeing themselves on screen. “This was for sure a great experience for me.”
Mike Tursi of Eatontown, the former Mater Dei track and cross country coach for 30 years, said, “It was wonderful seeing the school come back to life!”
As a background extra, Tursi said he also “enjoyed the experience, both seeing movies be made in real life, but also seeing many of my former athletes be picked as background actors as well.
Tursi picked himself out on screen during many of the outdoor scenes, he said.
Mater Dei Prep originally opened in 1961 as a parochial school run by St. Mary’s, part of its 32-acre campus that includes the church, an elementary school, a gymnasium and the high school. In 2015, after years of declining enrollment and financial mismanagement, the parish announced the high school’s closure. With help from interested alumni, the school reorganized as an independent Catholic school under the Diocese of Trenton for the 2016 school year. However, enrollment struggles continued, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the school closed permanently in June 2022.
“Mean Girls” is in theaters now.
This article originally appeared in the January 18 – 24, 2024 print edition of The Two River Times.
