'They Always Cast Us Around the Men': Jaime Pressly, Rachael Leigh Cook, and More '90s Teen Queens Look Back on the Genre They Invented

Since breaking into film at age 19 with her role as Party Girl #1 in the star-studded Can't Hardly Wait, Jaime Pressly, now 40, has gone on to have a prolific film and television career. Her role as unhinged Joy Turner on My Name Is Earl garnered her a Golden Globe nomination in 2008. She currently stars alongside Anna Faris and Allison Janney on ABC's Mom.

"I was 19 when I was cast in Can't Hardly Wait, and I believe it was my very first studio film ever. I remember being there and thinking to myself, Who, out of all of these people is going to be here in 10, 20 years from now, and who's just here for the bit role? So many of us stayed around. Lauren Ambrose, Seth Green, Donald Faison, Peter Facinelli, Jennifer Love Hewitt, the list is insane. I was just so grateful to be cast; the fact that my role was Girl Number One, or whatever, didn't bother me whatsoever, because Jennifer Love Hewitt was the biggest thing since sliced bread at the time. The fact that I got to play one of her girlfriends was awesome. Beggars can't be choosers in the beginning of your career.

It was definitely its own genre at the time, and Can't Hardly Wait was one of the first. You kind of knew when you were on that set that you were a part of something big. Back then it was, like, Amy Smart and Leslie Bibb, Tara Reid, and me in the same room together, always. Hell, Reese Witherspoon would’ve been in there too.

We'd all joke about it as actresses. Let's say the character you’re going out for was written as having black hair and dressing really high-end. Well, when you’re starting out and you don’t have a lot of money, you don’t have high-end clothes to wear to the audition, but you do your best. You’re certainly not going to go dye your hair black when you have blond hair, but you think you assume that [casting directors] are going to have an imagination. That if you’re really good in the role, they’re gonna be like, 'We’ll just dye her hair black or put a wig on her and put her in designer clothes and she’ll be perfect,' because it should be about the acting, right? I can't tell you how many times I’ve heard this feedback: 'She was fantastic. She was great. She nailed it. But, you know, the character has black hair…and she’s got blond hair.' Or, 'She didn't look high-end enough.' It’s was like that for all of us. Whoever was blond and blue-eyed, they’d put you us all in the same [bucket], as if that’s all you are: blond-haired and blue-eyed. They’d forget you could actually do something else, look like something else. There would be 30 of us up for the same role.