During awards season each year, it feels like all of the big-name actors have to be in a thousand places at once. From accepting awards to walking the red carpet to presenting awards to their colleagues, there's no end to the obligations, fun, and excitement.
But sometimes, obligations might overlap—and actors might have to make a tough choice about which event to attend. For Malcolm in the Middle star Frankie Muniz, his tough choice came back in 2000, and he wrestled with it for the most adorable reason.
The actor had been asked to co-host the Kids' Choice Awards alongside the main host, Rosie O'Donnell, as well as other guest stars like Mandy Moore, David Arquette, and LL Cool J.
But the person Muniz was concerned about was fellow co-host Amanda Bynes, who was at the top of her game on All That and The Amanda Show.
Muniz remembered:
"I told my agent back then, I want to be on 'All That.' I want to be on 'The Amanda Show.' Because I had a huge crush on Amanda Bynes as a kid, and I thought that those were the funniest, most amazing shows."
While he wasn't invited to guest-star or join the cast for these shows, he got the next best thing.
"Then my mom gets a call one day, and she's freaking out, so excited. It's Gail Berman, who at the time was the president of Fox. She goes, 'You got asked to host 'Saturday Night Live.' I'm like, 'What's that?' And she's like, 'It's huge. You'll be one of the youngest people ever. It's this big deal.'"
But Muniz knew what he was committed to.
"I asked when it was, and she said April third, and I'm like, 'Oh, h**l no, I am going to the Kids' Choice Awards. I don't care. I'm meeting Amanda Bynes at the Kids' Choice Awards!'"
"For about a week and a half, I had every executive, every producer, everybody in the history of Fox TV, Regency TV, going, 'What are you doing?! You don't understand!'"
"But I was like, 'No no, I don't back out of obligations. I committed. I'm not going to back out of the Kids' Choice Awards. They've been airing my commercials, saying that I'm going to be co-hosting."
"So I met Amanda Bynes... briefly."
You can watch the interview segment here.
- YouTubewww.youtube.com
The segment also became popular on TikTok, where viewers found Muniz's commitment adorable.
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Others were relieved to hear that Muniz's childhood acting career actually sounded kid-friendly.
A lot of information has come out in the last few years about what happened on Nickelodeon kid shows during the 1990s and early 2000s, particularly where Dan Schneider was involved. One of the impacted actors was Amanda Bynes, who has dramatically transformed her appearance, lifestyle, and even her name since her acting career dissolved.
Though Muniz is more involved in NASCAR now than his acting career, going on a different path than Bynes seems to have made a serious difference, in tragic retrospect.
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Though Saturday Night Live might have been the bigger and flashier option, it makes sense for a child star to appear on the Kids' Choice Awards when Nickelodeon was at the top of its game.
Plus, this whole story is just adorable. Though Muniz only met Bynes briefly the night of the awards, he later acted with her on the 2002 Big Fat Liar film, and it says a lot about his ability to keep his word after he's already made a commitment, even if everyone around him is encouraging him to back out of it for something "bigger and better."
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