Teenage 90s television star Melissa Joan Hart, best known for her role as the eponymous lead character on Sabrina the Teenage Witch, opened up what almost got her fired from the hit show in the middle of its successful run. Apparently a hint lies in a photo she took with Britney Spears at the New York premiere for her 1999 film Drive Me Crazy.
Hart spoke with fellow 90s sitcom stars Danielle Fishel, Will Friedle and Rider Strong — who all starred together on the TGIF staple Boy Meets World — on their podcast that they co-host together called (what else?) Pod Meets World. Hart revealed in her appearance on the Monday episode of the podcast that her puffy eyes from her photo with pop star Britney Spears were a result of the day's behind-the-scenes Sabrina the Teenage Witch drama in which she nearly got fired from the show.
“If you look at my eyes, I had been crying all evening,” said Hart. “At the time, I thought this was the worst day of my life.”
The event that precipitated the pouty picture and near-firing stemmed from Hart's appearance in a racy photoshoot for Maxim magazine. Hart was photographed for a cover shoot for Maxim's October 1999 issue. The cover picture the magazine went with showcased the actress dressed in black lingerie and a white sheet that covered her bare chest. Along with the picture, the cover splashed the headline, “Sabrina, Your Favorite Witch Without a Stich!”
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That prompted legal problems for Hart, who was also dealing with a recent breakup and a previous firing from a film role in Scary Movie when her lawyer showed up at a Planet Hollywood premiere afterparty with more bad news.
“My lawyer shows up and goes, ‘You did a photoshoot for Maxim magazine?' I'm like, ‘Yes, I did,' ” Hart explained. “They're like, ‘Well, you're being sued and fired from your show, so don't talk to the press. Don't do anything.' ”
Hart said the issue at hand was the magazine's use of her Sabrina character's name in the headline — because it violated a clause in her contract with Archie Comics, the publisher of the comic book series on which the Sabrina sitcom was based.
“(The contract) said I would never play the character naked,” said Hart. “So, here they were thinking I'm in breach because I'm playing the character. No, that was supposed to be me promoting my movie: It wasn't supposed to be a character. I had no control over what they wrote on the cover.”
Ultimately, Hart explained she was able to resolve the situation and keep her starring sitcom role − after writing an apology letter. Then, in a bit of silver lining, the Maxim cover hoopla generated a serious publicity boost for Drive Me Crazy at the box office.
Hart summarized the controversy surrounding the media coverage of the Maxim cover, looking back with fresh eyes: “Can Melissa be sexy? She's 23, is she allowed to be sexy? What's going on here? … Why is she being fired from her show?” She continued, “… it made for ‘Drive Me Crazy' to come out and be a huge success.”
It was a rather ironic ending to a very 90s controversy for Melissa Joan Hart, which in another life would have made it a great lyric to another pop cultural staple of that era, Alanis Morissette's “Ironic”. But that's enough nostalgia for one day.
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