Hilary Duff and Chad Michael Murray co-starred in one of the best teen rom-coms, A Cinderella Story, and they're still beloved, in part, due to that film. The pair became synonymous during the early aughts and, around that time, One Tree Hill star even invited Duff to the premiere of Freaky Friday, in which he co-starred with Lindsay Lohan. Duff recently explained that the invite came amid her feud with Lohan, but how much of that was actually Murray aware of?
Lohan and Duff were the true teen queens of the '00s, to say the least In time, the two Disney alums were in an alleged love triangle with pop singer Aaron Carter, contributing to their aforementioned tiff. So, from the outside looking in, Murray inviting Duff to the premiere of Freaky Friday (streamable with a Disney+ subscription), where Lohan was in attendance, would seem shady. Murray cleared the air, set the record straight, however, while appearing on Virgin Radio Toronto:
I didn’t know there was a feud…. How was I supposed to know there was a feud?
To me personally, Chad Michael Murray doesn’t seem like the type to knowingly get himself entangled in such drama. Still, it's so wild that by extending the invitation to Duff (who "glows" according to her former co-star), Murray became a key footnote in the Duff/Lohan feud.
Article continues belowHilary Duff's crashing of the Freaky Friday premiere came up during a recent episode of Call Her Daddy. It was during that episode of the podcast, that Duff confirmed she accepted the invite in order to spite her “childhood nemesis.” She even went so far as to admit she told Murray she “probably should” attend the premiere after he invited her. Although there certainly seemed to be some drama brewing beneath the surface, Murray -- who said he only found out about the beef after the premiere -- actually had a more practical reason for inviting Duff to that event:
I found out quickly after [the premiere]. We were filming, and we had a big kissing sequence and they wanted our characters to kind of get to know each other. And they’re like, ‘Hey guys, you need to hang out, get to know each other. We don’t need people clamming up.’ And so we started spending time together. It was great.
Honestly, I like the idea of the Cinderella Story crew wanting Murray and Duff to get to know each other during filming, and I'd argue that it worked. Many who love the film say both actors have great chemistry in it, and I'm among those who loves seeing the two play off each other on camera. However, as mentioned during the interview, it is ironic that the producers would want Duff and Murray to try to hang out casually during an event that was far from normal.
Chad Michael Murray's intentions aside, Lindsay Lohan ended up retaliating in her own way when she attended Hilary Duff’s Cheaper by the Dozen premiere. Lohan even poked fun at the Agent Cody Banks star in a 2004 SNL skit where Rachel Dratch portrayed an over-the-top version of Duff. Amid his recent interview, Murray continued to talk about being completely oblivious to any of that drama between the two actresses:
There was no free time and, by the way, I didn’t understand that there was drama or that that would even cause a thing. Like nowadays, I can understand that we're so kind of in the know with social media that like, oh if you do that it's obvious. Back then, it wasn't obvious that it was a thing. I just thought, ‘Two people are going to go hang out, cool, it's awesome.’
Murray -- who's married to Sarah Roemer and shares three kids with her -- makes a good point that if the whole feud were happening today, everything would have been overanalyzed on social media. But, back in the ‘00s, feuds existed, but I'd argue that they were harder to track without intense tracking across digital mediums.
Fortunately, Lindsay Lohan and Hilary Duff’s beef is so yesterday (sorry, I had to do it), as Duff said the two agreed that they were “good” when they saw each other at a club and celebrated with a shot. The Raise Your Voice actress even had a sense of humor when kids mistook her for Lohan in a Betches video. Considering the two singer/actresses are both grown now and married with kids, it's very understandable why they'd now just want to let bygones be bygones.
Who would have thought that Chad Michael Murray’s innocent invitation for Hilary Duff to attend one of his premieres would contribute to one of the most awkward teen-Hollywood rivalries? The drama may have been tantalizing to those in the know years ago but, today, I'm glad it all appears to be water under the bridge.
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