Will Friedle thought he wouldn’t join the Boy Meets World spinoff Girl Meets World—until a deal flipped the script. At the Doc Meets World premiere during the Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday, June 6, the actor said producer Michael Jacobs initially told him
Will Friedle didn’t plan to say “yes” to Girl Meets World.
At least, not at first.
On Saturday. June 6. the 49-year-old actor walked the Doc Meets World premiere red carpet at the Tribeca Film Festival and told Us Weekly that he had no intention of joining the Boy Meets World spinoff—especially after producer Michael Jacobs told him he couldn’t write for the show. Friedle said that changed after “we made a deal.”.
“If I came back on camera and did three episodes, then I could write it. So, we did a little, a little trading,” Friedle said at the premiere.
He did end up writing a couple episodes of Girl Meets World, and he described the moment he learned the spinoff was becoming a real possibility.
“I wasn’t going to do it, and not only because of the acting [and my anxiety] but I found out about GMW when, like, CNN called and asked for a comment,” Friedle explained during the Doc Meets World event.
Friedle said Jacobs initially put a hard stop on his ambitions.
“And [Jacobs] said you can do whatever on the show, and I said, ‘I want to be a writer,’ and he was like, ‘You can’t do that.’”
A decade and more after Boy Meets World ended in 2000, Girl Meets World premiered on Disney Channel and followed Cory (Ben Savage) and Topanga (Danielle Fishel)’s daughter, Riley Matthews. The spinoff ran from 2014 to 2017.
For Friedle, the path to the show wasn’t a straight line. Five years after Girl Meets World wrapped. he reunited with Fishel and Boy Meets World costar Rider Strong for the podcast “Pod Meets World.” The three rewatches episodes of Boy Meets World and offers commentary alongside various guests. including their former costars.
Before the Tribeca Film Festival, Friedle also got candid about another kind of connection—one that predated all the spinoff agreements.
On Thursday, June 4, during the “Pod Meets World” podcast episode, he told Fishel that he had a “crush” on her years earlier.
“I told you, years later, I had a crush on you, Danielle,” Friedle said. “Years later, I almost asked you out.”
Fishel shared she “never knew” about the crush until Friedle admitted it. Friedle clarified that the feelings came around “2005, [2006], something like that,” explaining that they were hanging out again after Boy Meets World.
“I remember there was one time where we were hanging out, and … I was single and Danielle was single. I was like, ‘Oh, that might be interesting to entertain,’” Friedle said. “There would have been a weirdness to it.”
Strong, meanwhile, had already told the podcast cohosts that the lack of a relationship was for the best. Friedle agreed, saying it would have changed far more than just their status on-screen.
“It would have been a whole different podcast, I’m sure, at that point,” he said. “And she wouldn’t have met [her husband Jensen Harp], and I wouldn’t have met [his wife Susan Martens]. And, yeah, we wouldn’t have been happy.”
The story of Friedle’s Girl Meets World return is, in the end, about limits and timing—about a “no” that didn’t last, and about choices that kept relationships, careers, and friendships on the tracks they ultimately took.
Will Friedle Girl Meets World Boy Meets World spinoff Michael Jacobs Doc Meets World Tribeca Film Festival Pod Meets World Danielle Fishel Rider Strong Jensen Harp Susan Martens