Never Meet Your Hero, Unless Your Hero Is Judy Blume

Admittedly, she had her fears. For nearly 50 years, she turned down offers to adapt Margaret—about the titular sixth grader who barters with God and feels she must, she must, she must increase her bust—until director Kelly Fremon Craig wrote to her then flew down to Florida to make a case face-to-face. 

“She could tell my adoration for her was sincere,” Fremon Craig told E! News. “When I wrote her that letter, it was a love letter. It was how much her work had been a guiding light for me. I wanted to write things that made people feel the way Judy Blume made me feel.”

Mission accomplished. Once convinced, Blume—who joked “it’s amazing I’m around to see this”—had one sticking point: “‘You cannot turn this into today,'” she instructed Fremon Craig of the 1970s-set book. “It would be completely different.” Though, as she allowed, “the feelings would be the same.”

Because while Gen Z has TikTok, Snapchat, YouTube and whatever else the kids are into, they’re still forced to forge through those awkward years just like the rest of us. 

“Electronics change, the way we live might change, but what’s inside, I don’t think that changes so much,” Blume mused. “There’s a connection there between generations.”