Throw your hands up if you knew this major Cheetah Girls casting secret.
Adrienne Bailon-Houghton recently opened up about how different the titular girl group in the 2003 Disney Channel Original Movie nearly looked. Recalling the early days working on the film, the E! News co-anchor explained how Beyoncé's younger sister Solange Knowles was originally set to play Aquanetta "Aqua" Walker before being replaced by Kiely Williams.
"I was told that the other girls that were chosen were Raven-Symoné as Galleria, Sabrina Bryan as Dorinda, myself as Chanel, and Solange Knowles as Aqua," Adrienne said on a July 11 episode of the We Said What We Said With Rickey and Denzel podcast. "The character is supposed to be from Houston, Texas. She has the Texas accent, the hot sauce."
She added, "It was supposed to be Solange, and originally she was supposed to be the cast member, and at the last minute, for whatever reason, ended up not doing the film."
Ultimately, Kiely stepped into the role, with her, Adrienne and Sabrina reprising the role for two sequel films as well as performing as the Cheetah Girls until the group disbanded in 2008.
While Solange has never spoken publicly about the matter, this is not the first time someone involved in the Cheetah Girls films has spoken about the casting change.
"They auditioned hundreds of girls for the four roles," Sabrina told the International Business Times in 2018. "Solange Knowles was there. And she was originally booked as Aqua."
But as she added, the Bring It On: All or Nothing star didn't stay in the role for long as she ultimately moved on to her own projects.
"By the time we started, it was Kiely the whole time," Sabrina noted. "That was the year Solange was getting ready to release an album. She was working on her own solo artist-type stuff, and, I think, from what I've heard, was that they were just worried that it being her first album that it was gonna be a little bit too much for her to be able to juggle everything, with filming and all that kind of stuff."
While Adrienne, Kiely and Sabrina reprised their roles in all the Cheetah Girls films, Raven-Symoné opted not to return for the third movie, The Cheetah Girls: One World, released in 2008. However, she has not ruled out participating in another Cheetah Girls project that reunited the cast.
"I would do it in a heartbeat," the That's So Raven alum told Adrienne and co-anchor Justin Sylvester on E! News in February. "We are in the era of a reboot, honey. We love a reboot."
She added, "I'm not trying to act that much anymore—I want to direct. But if there was something that we did together, it would be us and you would be surprised, it would smash."
Check out the Cheetah Girls cast, now and then: