9 Shocking Facts You Didn’t Know About ‘Hannah Montana’
Last week, Miley Cyrus and the rest of the Hannah Montana cast celebrated the 10 year anniversary of the Disney Channel series heard ’round the world. That’s right — the half-musical, half-comedy that spawned thousands of blonde wig-clad little girls running around singing “The Best of Both Worlds” and “Rockstar” in their Halloween costumes (not to mention several soundtrack CDs, national arena tours that sold out in record time, and a blockbuster movie spin-off of the same name) is officially a decade old.
Present-day Miley paid tribute to the 10-year anniversary in her usual weird way, by uploading a photo of herself lighting up in front of the television on which she watched a throwback episode and proclaiming on Instagram, “Even though HM is chopped up into little tiny pieces and buried in my backyard she will always hold a very special place in my heart!”
Do you, Miley. We’ll instead celebrate the day with 10 shocking facts you probably forgot about Hannah Montana.
In the season three episode, "He Ain't a Hottie, He's My Brother," Miley has an elaborate, episode-long nightmare in which she dreams her best friend Lilly is dating her brother Jackson. The two even share a kind-of, sort-of kiss (the screen is kind of dark and the scene cuts just before their lips touch). But what makes things even more awkward than your BFF dating your annoying older brother is that IRL, Jason Earles (who played Jackson) is 15 years older than Emily Osment (who plays Lilly). Season 3 debuted in 2008, making Emily 16 at the time and Jason, 31.
Before Miley Cyrus nabbed the leading role on Hannah Montana, the quirky character we've come to know and love as Miley Stewart was originally supposed to be named Chloe Stewart.
Mitchell Musso's near shoulder-length hair wasn't just a staple of his on-screen character, Oliver Oken. Disney Channel actually preferred Mitchell's hair to be this long, as to cover his pierced ears.
They played besties through and through on television, but the real Miley revealed in her 2009 memoir Miles to Go that things weren't as lovey-dovey between herself and her co-star Emily as they were between their characters. She admitted that the girls were competitive with each other and had a rough start from the get-go, citing that Emily had a more established acting career than she did when they both booked Hannah. Eventually though, they grew out of their competitiveness and were able to stay great friends.
Miley kept it all in the family while shooting HM. Obviously you know her father was on the show was Robbie Ray, as well as Dolly Parton (Miley's godmother). In fact, her little sister Noah Cyrus appeared in six different episodes.
The title of each HM episode didn't just come out of nowhere. Each episode title is actually a clever play on a famous song.
Hannah Montana helped launched the Disney Channel career of Tiffany Thorton, who later went on to co-star with Demi Lovato in Sonny With a Chance and its spin-off series So Random! She played Becky, Jackson's girlfriend, in two episodes.
Noah isn't the only Cyrus sister who got in on the Hannah Montana fan. Miley's older sister, Brandi Cyrus, also appeared in several episodes of the Disney Channel show. Maybe you spotted her on stage with Hannah? After all, she played Hannah's guitarist in three episodes.
