I’m The Cheetah Girls’ creator – I based it on my life and I always wear leopard print, yes the feud rumors are true
IT’S been over 20 years since the release of the first Cheetah Girls movie, but the “tails” of the catty behavior behind the scenes live on.
Author and co-producer Deborah Gregory’s own story – which she has never talked about before – is also just as movie-worthy as the revolutionary franchise.
Prior to the Cheetah Girls release in 2003, Disney Channel had never produced a film led by a predominantly black and brown cast.
And they haven’t made anything similar since.
A main draw for the show was that each of the four main characters had a different skin color and body type.
And the hugely popular franchise was based on Deborah’s own life, right down to the fact she wears leopard print every day.
Still, not everything was as it seemed on set.
Deborah wanted to use an unknown cast, but Disney chose more famous faces.
This included Raven-Symone, Rob Kardashian’s now ex-girlfriend Adrienne Bailon, Sabrina Bryan, and Kiely Williams.
“I always thought it was interesting, these little cat fights,” Deborah exclusively told The U.S. Sun.
“There was a big split between Raven and the the rest of the girls. Because she was a star from a little kid.
“The most infuriating thing was Raven not doing the third movie.
“Just murder my franchise why don’t you? That was just horrible.
“There was even an 88 city tour and she didn’t go on it. There was plenty of truth about some rift.
“I was very hurt. I was crushed. Especially because it’s so unfair to the kids. There’s no replacing a character.
“Everything has an end. It wasn’t going to go over forever. You shoot the movie and go home. It’s done.
“I really wanted the girls to be unknown because in my mind the kids would really think it was real. But studios think about stardom.
“They think in terms of getting the biggest names as they can get for lots of parts.
“In this case, I know my thinking was right and sure enough look at what happened.”
Child star Raven got her big break on The Cosby Show in 1989 and starred in the popular series That’s So Raven from 2003, then aged 15, to 2007.
In an Instagram Live in April 2020, Raven and Kiely admitted they had fallen out with Adrienne, and that Cheetah Girls 3 failed because Raven wasn’t in it.
Fans may also not know that Solange Knowles, Beyonce’s younger sister, was originally set to play one of the girls until scheduling conflicts got in the way.
Deborah, who sells cheetah print items on her vintage Etsy site, has inspired more than one generation of cubs.
Some of the Kardashian kids, including North West and Penelope Disick, even dressed up as the famous girl group created by Gregory last Halloween.
“I’m Miss Cheetah Hardcore,” Deborah said. “I made my first dress by hand at 11. I sewed the fabric by hand.
“I remember it came apart in class and my girlfriend gave me her sweater to wear, because you could see my bloomers.”
While some parts of the series openly had Deborah’s cheetah prints all over them, she didn’t reveal the similarities between her own life and other aspects until later.
Fans of the franchise know that the Cheetah Girls’ own Dorinda was a foster care child, who often hid her background from the other girls.
But they might not know that Deborah was inspired to base the character off of her own upbringing in the foster care system.
Also much like the series, which is centered around four young girls seeking superstardom, Deborah dreamed of something more.
What Deborahdidn’t know at the time was that she was multiracial, much like her lead character.
“I made Galleria Garibaldi half-Italian and half-Black because I thought it was funny,” she said.
“I also decided that she would come from the city of Bologna because it sounds like bolognese. I said ‘oh the kids will love that.’
“I then to come find out after doing a DNA test that I am also half-Italian and half-Black. And that was spooky.”
And that wasn’t the only similarity.
“If I had a choice, I would be a singer playing in some dinky club for $100 in Amsterdam.
“I just love the idea and I don’t see it as some star nonsense thing.
“But I cannot sing. I look like a singer, I act like a singer but I don’t have the voice honey.
“So that’s Dorothea Garibaldi, that’s Galleria’s mother.”
Galleria’s mother – who was played by Lynn Whitfield – owns a plus-size boutique, also inspired by Deborah.
“That was me. I had a boutique in New York called Fun and Larger Sizes,” she said.
One of her most frequent clients was the fashion editor of Essence magazine at the time.
After Deborah convinced – or in her words “harassed” – her until she let her write for the magazine, her journey took even more unbelievable turns.
While serving as a fashion and beauty writer at the publication, she wound up getting assigned to interview Destiny’s Child in Houston.
“Girl groups are not big like they used to be, but where I come from it was all about girl groups,” she said.
“I loved writing about girl groups.”
After watching a documentary during an Essence work lunch about someone who goes on a search for her birth mother, Deborah broke down.
“I had never talked about it and I lost it,” she said.
“Susan Taylor, our editor-in-chief, convinced me to go on a search for her. My mom.
“I wound up writing a story about it called Searching for Mommy.”
The former model, who grew up in New York, figured out that she was born in Brooklyn.
She went down South to find a cousin and discovered that her mother was a singer.
“I was always obsessed with girl groups and thought it was because of Diana Ross and the pretty outfits,” she said.
“It was a way for me to escape this horrible situation I was in but now I come to find out that it was a part of who I am all along.”
After taking a DNA test and hiring a renowned genealogist, Deborah also uncovered who her real father was – and that her paternal grandparents were immigrants were from Italy.
And fashion was also part of her inner fabric – literally.
“I come from long line of tailors,” she said.
“When I went to meet another first cousin in New Jersey, I noticed an old Singer sewing machine in her house.
“She explained that my aunt made clothes and my grandmother was the manager of the factory.
“So my fashion sense did come from that.”
Her love of clothing came through so prominently in The Cheetah Girls that it was almost a character itself throughout the series.
Today, Deborah continues to connect with old family members and recently took long lost relatives from Italy to try some soul food in Harlem.
During the Covid pandemic, she also dug through even more foster care records.
Deborah discovered that caseworkers had found out that her father was paying for her mother’s rent, but didn’t want anyone to know who he was.
“It shows it wasn’t a one-night stand,” she said.
The overall story, however, was more of an escape for the writer.
“I made the whole thing up but the kids thought it was real so they didn’t know that.
“I got the idea after watching an episode of Where are they Now with David Cassidy of the Partridge family.
“It was the first time I realized that the show wasn’t based off of a real family.
“That really got my wheels turning. I started out with the books because I wanted to get the kids to read.
“I also added the concept of the concert and the clothes so I really took it 50 steps further.”
The Cheetah Girls also marked the first time the studio had made a musical feature film.
The first of the three movies was a massive success, racking up over 84 million views.
Deborah wants to know just one thing.
“Where’s my remake? I think it’s unfair. And this thing is so popular it’s unbelievable,” she asked.
“I get emails from Sweden and from people of every nationality all over the world who grew up on this and still love it.
“They already own the dramatic rights. It’s in their vault.
“The kids are begging for it, it’s a classic.”
Fans of the trilogy continue to post movie memes and listen to the group’s music on Spotify over two decades later.
The music platform still record over half a million hits to Cheetah Girls music on a daily basis.
Students from FSU even flew from Florida to New York last year to make a 12-minute documentary on Deborah called Mama Cheetah.
The future filmmakers followed her around for a week.
And yes, she’s still fighting for that remake.
