Lacey Chabert’s Surprising ‘Family Guy’ Role: She Was Meg Before Mila Kunis Took Over
The Hallmark star voiced Meg Griffin in season 1—plus the real reason she left the show
Key Takeaways
- Before Lacey Chabert found fame on Hallmark, she already had a vast resume.
- In addition to her work on screen, she also lent her voice to one major animated sitcom.
- Lacey Chabert voiced Meg Griffin in the first season of 'Family Guy.'
These days, you can’t tune in to the Hallmark Channel without seeing Lacey Chabert’s shining smile. The 43-year-old actress, who prior to her Hallmark fame shined in the 2004 comedy Mean Girls, has become a fixture on the network known for heartwarming romances and cozy mysteries. While we’ve grown to love her work in front of the camera, the actress has lent her voice to several series over the years—and one iconic character lines her resume.
Lacey Chabert voiced Meg Griffin in the first season of Family Guy before Mila Kunis took over the role, and most don’t realize the Hallmark star played a part in this long-running sitcom. Here, read all about Lacey Chabert, her surprising Family Guy gig and why she left the series.
The story behind Lacey Chabert voicing Meg on ‘Family Guy’
In 1999, Chabert made her Family Guy debut voicing Meg Griffin on the hit series and took part in the show’s first season. Though Mila Kunis eventually took over the role and Family Guy has since become a television phenomenon, Chabert insisted that there was no bad blood surrounding her exit.
“I actually left the show of my own accord,” Chabert clarified in conversation with GameSpy. “And only because I was in school and doing Party of Five at the time. But I think the show is hilarious, and I don’t have a grudge against her [Kunis] at all. I think she’s a great actress.”
The show’s creator, Seth MacFarlane, also pulled the curtain back on Chabert being replaced in an interview with IGN. “It was just purely a contractual thing. Lacey Chabert, I think there was a mistake in her contract, and I guess she had not intended to be involved for the full run of the show. I don’t even remember. To be honest, I don’t really, to this day, know what it was,” He explained. “It was nothing—there was no tension or anything. She wanted to go, and she was very cool about it. We obviously don’t want to keep anyone there who doesn’t want to be there. So, you know, it was early on enough in the show that it wasn’t a huge—that happens from time to time, you’ve got to replace a voice actor.”
Party of Five, the ’90s drama, starred familiar faces like Scott Wolf, Matthew Fox, Neve Campbell and Jennifer Love Hewitt. The series followed a group of five siblings who, after the tragic death of their parents, navigate life on their own under the guardianship of their oldest brother.
“I feel like so much of who I am now as an adult, so much of it is from the influence that that amazing group of people had on me from the ages of 11 to 17,” Chabert revealed to UsWeekly. “I went through a lot of firsts, like, kind of every first that a girl from 11 to 17 can go through. And a lot of times [whatever] it was hadn’t yet happened for me in real life—or it was a first time—and, you know, there was so much reality to it.”
From Meg Griffin to Hallmark royalty, Lacey’s career path shows us that the best journeys aren’t always straight lines—they’re filled with surprising turns that lead us exactly where we’re meant to be.
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