If you’re looking for your next favorite prom movie, look no further than Prom Dates. The Hulu movie premiered on Friday, May 3, and includes so many young, rising stars including HSMTMTS actress Julia Lester, Ginny & Georgia‘s Antonia Gentry and ZOMBIES star Terry Hu, among others.
The rom-com follows Julia and Antonia’s characters Hannah and Jess, respectively, high school students who have a years-old pact to have the best prom ever — something they were close to having until both of their dates fall through the night before prom. So, the girls decide to attempt to find other dates within 24 hours — which leads to a hilarious, and heavily embarrassing chain of events and some friendship drama.
We spoke to Julia and Terry, who plays Julia’s love interest, Angie. Keep reading to see our exclusive interview with the actors!
“Terry and I both sort came from the Disney circle, and so it was really fun to venture out and do something a little bit more raunchy, but still keep that same heart and humor,” Julia told J-14 exclusively of Prom Dates. “I feel like it was the perfect next project after being on High School Musical for so many years, and I really learned so much on that set that I got to take with me into this project.
“This is definitely a feel good comedy,” she added.
Both costars have starred in two iconic Disney franchises — as Julia is best known for playing Ashlyn in High School Musical: The Musical: The Series for four seasons, and Terry starred as A-Spen in the third ZOMBIES movie, which came out in 2022.
“I knew about Julia just through the Disney community and also because she was just point blank famous and is just so talented,” Terry said of their costar. “I literally knew about her and I would see her at certain Disney events, but I just didn’t really, I don’t know, shy or nervous or whatever. A lot of it’s a big Disney community, so it’s hard to go up to every single person, but then we got to meet on this.”
“I think a lot of friendships have been made on those franchises,” they added. “I’m very grateful to Disney for that. And now we’ve gotten to work together, too.”
On top of working with one another, the actors also got to work with some legends in the comedy biz, including Chelsea Handler and Pitch Perfect‘s John Michael Higgins.
“Oh, it was so fantastic,” Julia said of working with the comedians. “It was a real treat to be in a room with, like you said, sort of legends of comedy and watch them work and also be so kind and gracious and happy to be there. And they were so wonderful and just, I think they really complete the movie in such an exciting way.”
JT NEAL, TERRY HU, JULIA LESTER, KENNY RIDWAN, PATTY GUGGENHEIM, EMERY KELLY Disney/Frank Micelotta
While Terry didn’t get to work with Chelsea, who played Kenny Ridwan‘s characters’ mom, they did reveal that they met John and he was “so funny.”
“You can just tell he carries himself with this presence and groundedness and he is such a comedic legend,” Terry said of John. “We grew up watching him and he commits, as you see, he really commits, and it was such an honor to share the same spaces.”
As the two stars are both Disney actors, we had to ask the ultimate question — have they ever been to Disney prom?
“Well, I went to real high school prom, but the Disney proms are real,” Julia admitted. “I never got to go to one, and I don’t know if they’ve done them since [COVID], but yeah. They are real and they do look amazing. But I went to real prom in high school, so I had my prom moment, I feel.”
As for Terry, the actor had no idea of the existence of such an event, and joked they needed to “call Disney” up. However, they did attend their own high school prom where Terry had a “perfectly nice time.”
Prom Dates is currently streaming on Hulu — watch it now!
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