Back to Halloweentown? While the movie’s original stars haven’t said much about bringing the Halloweentown movies back to Disney Channel, Kimberly J. Brown has hinted at being down to reprise her iconic role as Marnie Piper.
The first movie — which spawned three sequels — premiered in 1998 and followed the story of Marnie, who discovered that she was a witch after a visit from her grandma Aggie (Debbie Reynolds) on Halloween night. Wanting to learn more about her family’s powers, the teen followed her grandmother on to a magical bus, which led Marnie and her siblings to Halloweentown. While there, the family figures out there’s a whole other world with ghosts, goblins and even evil warlocks who act as the town’s mayor by day.
More than 20 years after the movie’s premiere, it’s still a classic Halloween movie. The stars have even reunited and recalled working alongside Debbie, who died in 2016.
“[I] tried to soak up as much time with her as I could because she became another grandmother to me,” Kimberly told The Los Angeles Times in October 2020 about her late costar. “So much of their relationship on screen mirrored what our relationship was in real life, so I’m grateful for that time I got with her.”
Debbie played Aggie in all four movies, while Kimberly only appeared as Marnie in three of the films. Sara Paxton took over the role for the fourth film, Return to Halloweentown, which premiered via Disney Channel in October 2006. Despite not appearing in the final flick, the actress still has so much love for the franchise. Kimberly, along with Halloweentown II: Kalabar’s Revenge‘s costar and real-life fiancé, Daniel Kountz, also gushed over the movie’s impact while chatting with E! News in October 2021.
“The movies have definitely meant a lot to me just growing up, and now that they mean a lot to other people, it makes it so much more significant,” she gushed. “But now, there’s this aspect of our personal lives too that has bonded us in a different way. It definitely has just made it that much more special and just the irony, too, of us playing hardcore enemies and then being quite the opposite of that in real life.”
The couple, who started dating years after making the movie, also dished on the fans’ reactions to their relationship.
“I thought some people would notice, but it ended up going viral,” Kimberly said. “The comments were great. People were worried about Aggie’s spellbook still were like, ‘How can you date the enemy?!’ and then other people were like, ‘I shipped Marnie and Kal since the movie came out!'”
But what about filming another movie together? Scroll through our gallery to see what the Halloweentown cast has said about a possible reboot.
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