Danielle Fishel iconically chopped off her hair in a Boy Meets World episode — and some audience members got to take some of her locks home as a souvenir.
“You’ll be surprised to know we gave out pieces of my hair,” Fishel, 44, said on a recent episode of “Pod Meets World” that featured “Office Ladies” hosts Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey.
Fishel recalled how it was normal for the Boy Meets World cast and crew to hand out items like “signed scripts” and “props” to its live studio audience. While taping the episode “Hair Today, Goon Tomorrow,” some lucky fans took home some of Fishel’s hair, which she actually cut herself.
“I really did cut my hair. It was not a wig,” she said. “It was definitely my hair.”
In the episode, which aired in 1996, Fishel’s character Topanga impulsively chops off her hair to prove to Cory (Ben Savage) that looks aren’t important. However, Topanga’s grand gesture backfires after she ends up struggling with insecurities herself.
While Topanga’s decision to cut off her hair seemed impulsive, the plan to give Fishel a new look was always in the works. Fishel previously sought out permission from the show to cut her hair, which had grown very long.
“I really wanted to cut my hair. I had only had one haircut in my entire life, and it was when I was 2,” she recalled. “I had hair down to my butt from the time I was 2, and my hair at the end had little ring lit curls. My mom at one point decided I needed a trim, and they just cut off those curls and then I never had another haircut until that time.”
Fishel added that she was “ready to get rid of it.” However, there was pushback at first.
“I asked and Kaitlin Simpson Michael [Jacobs] said, at first, ‘No, absolutely not, no,’ and I persisted,” she said. “And then he said, ‘OK, at least let me write an episode about it.’”
Fishel added she was “a little bummed” at first because there was a long wait time between her initial request and when she was finally able to cut her locks.
“Here I’m asking in like June, and we don’t go back to production until August. I have to wait, and who knows when in the season it’ll be,” she explained. “But then we get pretty early on in the season, we get this haircutting episode.”
In addition to having to wait months for her haircut, Fishel had to negotiate with Jacobs about how short she could go.
“Right before I cut, Michael, our executive producer, said to me, ‘Show me where, show me where you’re planning on cutting,’ and I was like, ‘Here,’” Fishel recalled, claiming that Jacobs wanted a “longer” option. “It was an actual negotiation, and there was a lot of stress about whether or not I was going to listen because he knew I had all the power with the scissors in my hands.”
