Jennie Garth Wants a Real-Life Reunion With Former TV Sister Amanda Bynes
Years after What I Like About You, Jennie Garth says she hasn’t spoken to Amanda Bynes in ages and wants to reconnect, revealing it on Amanda Hirsch’s Not Skinny But Not Fat podcast in a clip shared by Us Weekly.
Jennie Garth says she has not seen or spoken to Amanda Bynes since their What I Like About You run ended almost two decades ago — and yes, she wants to fix that.
Where things stand with Amanda Bynes
In an exclusive clip shared by Us Weekly from this week's episode of Amanda Hirsch's podcast Not Skinny But Not Fat, Garth, 54, admitted she hasn't connected with Bynes in a long time. She sounded genuinely eager to change that, telling Hirsch she would love to reconnect.
Quick rewind: The WB sitcom era
Garth and Bynes co-led What I Like About You from 2002 to 2006 across four seasons. Bynes, now 40, played Holly, a teenager who moves in with her older, more buttoned-up sister Val, played by Garth. Garth says she was initially brought in for a chemistry read with Bynes — one of those behind-the-scenes knots that decide whether a show works — and remembers the series as straight-up fun.
Garth on Dan Schneider and how she handled him
While promoting her new book, I Choose Me (out earlier this month), Garth has been looking back at that time. On the April 15 episode of Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert, she talked about the show's creative brain trust: Will Calhoun — whom she called a top Friends exec — and Dan Schneider. Calhoun, 61, and Schneider, 60, co-created What I Like About You, and Schneider, who had worked closely with Bynes during her Nickelodeon years, was essentially the Amanda-side producer.
Shepard, 51, asked the question everyone asks now: did she get a bad vibe from Schneider, who has faced allegations of creating a toxic workplace and inappropriate behavior with young actors? ( After the 2024 docuseries Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, Schneider apologized for what he called past failures. Bynes has not accused Schneider of misconduct.)
"Yeah... to the point where I said to Will, like, 'I would rather just communicate solely with you. I trust you... I don't feel that way with your partner.' And he was like, 'No problem.'"
When cohost Monica Padman asked if she saw Schneider personally tearing Bynes down, Garth didn't pin it on one person. Her take: there were a lot of issues orbiting Bynes at the time, and it wasn't as simple as blaming a single figure.
Hear it yourself
- Not Skinny But Not Fat with Jennie Garth drops Tuesday, April 21, on all podcast platforms.