Jamie Lee Curtis Pushes Back on Harsh “Freakier Friday” Review as Sequel Opens Strong

Jamie Lee Curtis pushed back against a sharply negative appraisal of “Freakier Friday,” responding to a Time magazine review with an Instagram comment that read, “SEEMS a TAD HARSH. SOME people LOVE it. Me being one.” Her reply landed Aug. 9 as the film expanded in U.S. theaters following a late-July London premiere. The review she addressed carried the headline “Freakier Friday Is Humiliating to Everyone Involved.”

The sequel reunites Curtis and Lindsay Lohan from the 2003 hit and reworks the body-swap premise across two generations. Anna, now a mother, and her daughter, Harper, switch places, while Curtis’s Tess trades bodies with Harper’s soon-to-be stepsister, setting off a chain of wedding-week complications. The film opened Aug. 8 in the United States.

Early ticket sales suggest strong audience interest. Industry tallies pegged the movie’s Friday take at about $12.7 million, with weekend estimates hovering around the low-$30 million range. That placed it in a close race for the top spot amid a crowded slate, buoyed by nostalgia and the return of its original leads.

Critical reaction has spanned from enthusiastic to skeptical. Some reviewers praised the leads’ chemistry and the film’s family-friendly sentiment, while others pointed to frenetic pacing and reliance on callbacks. The range of views echoes the broader debate around studio reliance on legacy sequels—one that the Time critique framed in stark terms and that Curtis publicly disputed.

Curtis has been vocal about the project’s origins, saying in recent interviews that fan interest prompted her to call Disney’s chief executive to advocate for the sequel. Her defense of the film arrives as it seeks to convert opening-weekend momentum into sustained attendance with end-of-summer moviegoers.