:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/Claire-Danes-090124-062e299d58cb4bc886b14e24d5c7c0f4.jpg?w=696&resize=696,0&ssl=1 "Claire Danes: My So-Called Life")
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As the groundbreaking ABC teen drama My So-Called Life turns 30, its stars are reflecting on their experience making the short-lived but highly influential series.
Claire Danes recently told PEOPLE in a group interview with cast and crew like creator Winnie Holzman and costar Wilson Cruz, “I don’t think I had ever read a more accurate account of the experience that I was having in that moment.”
“I was just so thrilled to have my internal life articulated for me,” she continued. “It’s just an astonishing piece of writing…It was very intuitive. I didn’t have to reach very far.”
Claire Danes in ‘My So-Called Life’.
ABC Photo Archives/Disney
“It is really a radical show,” Danes said, crediting Holzman with creating “a genre of television that didn’t exist before” calling Holzman’s writing “pleasure-inducing, but also very deep and daring in these surprising ways.”
My So-Called Life debuted on ABC on Aug. 25, 1994 in the coveted 8 p.m. slot that would later be filled by behemoth hits like Grey’s Anatomy. Its 19-episode first season failed to capture an audience however, and it was canceled.
“It doesn’t matter who does it first, it matters who does it second,” Danes told PEOPLE. “I think My So-Called Life was a first, and I think that’s why it had such a limited lifespan. It was so new I think people didn’t immediately know how to register it.”
Reflecting on the series now, Danes feels “so grateful for its resilience, and that it can be shared from one generation to another.” She called it “a really rich and harrowing phase of life that we all go through,” adding that her “eldest son is 11 and a half, and I’m just bracing myself. We’re on the edge of it, and I’m a little anxious.”
Danes landed the lead role of Angela Chase at only 14 years old. Chase served as the narrator of all but two of the show’s episodes, as she navigated the thorny maze of adolescence – tricky friendships with characters played by Devon Odessa and A.J. Langer, and an enduring crush on Jared Leto’s Jordan Catalano.
The cast of ‘My So-Called Life’.
Mark Seliger/ABC/Getty Images
“I think it was just so surprising to really enter the world of a teenage girl who was so earnest and so curious and thoughtful and sensitive,” Danes said of the series’s lasting impact, which can be felt from the harrowing halls of Euphoria, to the dark introspection of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, to the quirky optimism of Lizzie McGuire.
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Danes remains close with the My So-Called Life cast and creator, participating in several reunions over the years, but she told ET in 2020 that she’s “probably not” interested in a reboot.
FAQs
Q: What was the premiere date of My So-Called Life?
A: My So-Called Life debuted on ABC on Aug 25, 1994.
Q: Who played the lead role in the series?
A: Claire Danes played the lead role of Angela Chase.
Q: Why was My So-Called Life canceled?
A: The show’s 19-episode first season failed to capture a significant audience, leading to its cancellation.
Credit: ew.com
