In 1993 Cory Matthews and Shawn Hunter became the best friends everyone wanted when Boy Meets World premiered on ABC. While Cory and Shawn were the main characters of the series when it started, storylines gradually expanded to include the popular female friend of the duo, Topanga Lawrence.
Topanga was the love of Cory’s life, and when the sequel series Girl Meets World debuted on the Disney Channel, she still was. The little girl wanted to save the world with her feminist views and her stance on environmentalism. She grew up to be a lawyer and marry Cory, but her story featured a lot of details fans might have missed the first time around.
Topanga Is A Scorpio
Though a handful of characters have their birthdays revealed in the series, Topanga isn’t one of them. Instead, based on information revealed in both Boy Meets World and Girl Meets World, Topanga’s birthday occurs after Halloween on October 1. Her birthday is also before the American Thanksgiving holiday, which is always the fourth Thursday in November.
The scorpio star sign belongs to those born between October 23 and November 21, making it the most likely sign for Topanga. Passionate, intuitive, and ambitious, Topanga is pretty much a perfect fit for the sign.
She Wasn’t Originally Played By Danielle Fishel
Fans who have listened to the commentary of the season one DVDs will already know this. Originally, a different actress was cast in the role of Topanga, who was supposed to be a secondary character. The actress didn’t play the role the way producers envisioned, and she was let go.
Fishel, who had been hired as a background actor in the classroom, then tested for the role along with Marla Sokoloff. Fishel ended up landing the role, though producers gave her extra notes to make sure she was prepared to return to film the next day.
The Actor’s Mother Created Her Crimped Hair
In the first season of the series, Topanga Lawrence had a pretty specific look. Her hair was often worn long and loose with plenty of crimping. That style wasn’t implemented by the hair department on the show, but by Fishel’s mother.
At night, Fishel’s mother would braid her hair into numerous plaits before she went to bed. Before going into filming the next day, her mother would then remove them all. Fishel revealed the information during the commentary recordings she made for the series on DVD.
Her Father Was Played By A Monkee
Topanga’s parents were not often played by the same actors. In fact, two different actresses played her mother over the course of the show, while three played her father.
One of the actors who played Topanga’s father was Peter Tork. Tork is most famous for his role in the classic musical series The Monkees. When he appeared on Boy Meets World, the show also posted a Monkees reunion of sorts. Mickey Dolenz and Davy Jones also appeared with Tork to perform a few songs for the anniversary of Cory’s parents.
Her Middle Name Is A Mystery
Many fans likely know that Topanga was named after Topanga Canyon in California. As the story goes, one of the producers was driving down the highway and passed the exit for the canyon when he decided on the name.
Topanga’s middle name on the series, however, is never revealed. She called it “weird” during the show, but never revealed what it was. Even over the course of Girl Meets World, there was never an occasion to reveal her middle name.
Topanga Married Because Of Poll Results
Showrunner Michael Jacobs wanted the high school years of the series to end with childhood sweethearts Cory and Topanga getting married. ABC wasn’t so sure about marrying a couple of teenagers. Instead, the network ran a poll amongst viewers.
When an overwhelming majority of viewers voted for Cory and Topanga to tie the knot, the network allowed Jacobs to add it into the show during the university years. In the middle of the show’s final season, the duo married, and that informed a lot of their future conflicts.
She Has A Tattoo
Actress Danielle Fishel actually has more than one tattoo. While the series never showed Topanga getting a tattoo, fans got a glimpse of one on the back of her neck in the series finale.
In the final episode, Cory, Topanga, Shawn, and Eric paid a visit to Mr. Feeney’s old classroom for one last goodbye. The hair team put Topanga in pigtails that exposed the back of her neck for the very first time in the series. Multiple cameras were set up so the scene was only filmed once, so no one noticed that fans would be able to see the Chinese characters on the back of Danielle Fishel’s neck until they were done.
Her Sister Vanished With Shawn’s
For most of the show’s run, Topanga was thought of as an only child. Back in the first season, however, that wasn’t the case. Her sister made a brief appearance to pick her up from the Matthews house.
Topanga’s big sister, Nebula Stop-The-War Lawrence, only appeared in that single episode. She was never mentioned again, and Topanga was even referenced as an only child later. Much like Shawn, Topanga’s family history was fleshed out more as the series progressed. Shawn also had an older sister in the first season, a result of him being given a line that was supposed to go to another actor, and she was never heard from again either.
No One Knows How She And Cory Really Fell In Love
When the series first began, Topanga was a girl in Cory’s classes who didn’t quite fit in, but Cory couldn’t help liking her. They two had a connection and an eventual friendship. Over the course of the show though, just how the two fell for one another was revealed - multiple times.
One story saw Cory and Topanga playing on the playground in elementary school and falling for one another then, but yet another claimed they’d been in one another’s lives practically since birth. Fans never learned how they came to love one another because the show would have the audience believe they always had, repeatedly changing the story of how they met and connected.
Topanga Got A Standing Ovation On Set
Before Girl Meets World launched on the Disney Channel, Danielle Fishel wrote a memoir about her experiences growing up in the acting world. Called Normally, This Would Be Cause For Concern: Tales Of Calamity And Unrelenting Awkwardness, Fishel featured stories about her experiences on the set of Boy Meets World.
In it, she recounted getting the role of Topanga. Fishel didn’t just land the role after an actress was fired. Show runner Michael Jacobson gave her a lot of notes on how to play the part. She went home and repeatedly went over everything he told her, staying up all night rehearsing. After performing on set the next day, Jacobson praised Fishel’s work and the entire crew gave her a standing ovation for taking over the part.