Before Hannah Simone went on to star in six seasons of Fox’s hit sitcom “New Girl” (Season 7 is in the works), she was a largely unknown former VJ trying to make a break for it in Hollywood.
These days, she’s used to being followed by the paparazzi — but even before “New Girl” came around, the British-Canadian actress got a taste for what her life would become after being mistaken for none other than Kim Kardashian.
“I remember when I first moved to L.A. [from Toronto] eight or nine years ago, I was coming out of a restaurant and I had my bangs and a high ponytail and Kim had just got cut bangs,” Simone told TheWrap.
“I wasn’t on a show — nothing. And then all of sudden this herd of paparazzi was chasing me down a street screaming, ‘Kim!’ I didn’t know what was happening, I didn’t know who Kim was,” she said.
“It wasn’t until a friend down the road yelled at me, ‘They think you’re Kim Kardashian!’ I was like — what the heck?”
Simone stopped by TheWrap Studios to promote Fox’s “Kicking and Screaming,” a new competitive reality series premiering March 9 on which she serves as host. The topic of the Kardashians came up when discussing Prince’s cameo in Season 3 of “New Girl.”
Prince, a fan of the show, had talked his way into making an appearance, according to “New Girl” star Zooey Deschanel, who confirmed the reason behind his cameo to Conan O’Brien in 2016. For a party sequence set at the musician’s house, some of the Kardashian brood were asked to appear and film cameos. Prince, however, was not having it and ordered to cut them from the scene, said Deschanel
Simone, for her part, said she never shot a scene with anyone from the Kardashian family.
“That’s the closest Ive ever gotten to a Kardashian: being mistaken for one,” she said.
Asked if she sees the resemblance, Simone said: “I don’t see it — I know we have a similar skin tone and sometimes a similar hair cut. But I think that’s where it ends.”
“Kicking and Screaming” airs on Fox, Thursdays at 9/8c.