Yes, you read that right, Solange Knowles was in the original casting of The Cheetah Girls.
In a podcast interview with "We Said What We Said With Rickey and Denzel," Adrienne Bailon revealed that Knowles was in the original Cheetah Girls casting. "I got the role and at the time, I was told that the other girls that were chosen were Raven-Symoné as Galleria, Sabrina Bryan as Dorinda, myself as Chanel, and Solange as Aqua," she said.
She continued, stating that Aqua's character was "supposed to be from Houston [and] has the Texas accent [and] the hot sauce."
Eventually, Kiely Williams took over as Aqua after Knowles "ended up not doing the film [...] at the last minute."
"I remember I was in dance rehearsal with [our girl group] 3LW and we got a phone call that said, ‘Is there any way that Kiely could jump into the role for Aqua?,'" Bailon said.
Following The Cheetah Girls premiere in 2003, it quickly became one of Disney's most well-known films, catapulting all four actresses into stardom. Having resonated so well with the fans, The Cheetah Girls 2 and The Cheetah Girls 3 were inevitably released, also having great success.
In an interview with E! News with Bailon in 2022, Symoné stated she would do another Cheetah Girls project "in a heartbeat."
"That's why [Bailon and I] did Raven's Home, that's why we're here," she said. "That's why any time [Bailon is] doing something, I'm down and I know she's the same for me. And I think that there's a wonderful thing to just encapsulate something and let it live. We are in the era of reboot, honey. We love a reboot."
