Like most parents, Alex and Jacqueline Zane, both Boston attorneys, have struggled to balance childcare and work during the pandemic. Desperate for activities to keep his kids entertained, Alex brought a building toy. Little Tikes Cozy Coupe Inside for the bathtub. After losing interest, their 5-year-old daughter, Matilda climbed atop the coupe and had an idea. “I immediately thought of the Michael J Fox scene in ‘Teen Wolf,'” the father said, adding that he showed Matilda a YouTube clip from the film showing him how to make an air guitar so she could take a picture. .
Zane sent the photo to his friend Andrew Kelly, a professional photographer in Colorado, and asked if it would be possible to make Matilda look like a werewolf for a more accurate representation of the scene in the film. “It was him who came up with the idea of (posing and photographing Matilda) once a day, five days a week,” Alex said in an interview with Today Parents.
Matilda went viral by recreating scenes from iconic movies like The Addams Family (Photo: Reproduction/Instagram)
From that moment on, the father and daughter began the journey of recreating the scenes in the film. During the day, Alex explored the scenes and Matilda took pictures. At night, Andrew put his photo editing skills to work. “She gets bored after 20 seconds, but she likes looking at pictures,” said her father. “The best part,” he said, is the relationship with his daughter. Matilda recreated iconic movie scenes from “Legally Blonde” to “You’ve Got Male” with the help of her father, and today, the two have amassed more than 63,000 followers on their Instagram profiles (@tot_for_tot_remakes), where they share photos. In the bio, the father wrote: “A five-year-old girl named Matilda and a giant stuffed fox recreate iconic movie scenes.”
“It’s crazy that anyone other than the family wants to see this,” the father said, noting that his Instagram account was dormant for nearly five years before he began posting the footage. “It’s crazy,” he said. What began as a desperate attempt to entertain his daughter turned into an unexpected experience for Alex. “In terms of family time, it was the best year of my life.”
Watch some of the scenes below:
Matilda in Star Wars (Photo: Playback/Instagram)
Matilda in Kung Fu (Photo: Reproduction / Instagram)
Martilda in the Bird Box (Photo: Reproduction / Instagram)
Matilda in Legally Blonde (Photo: Reproduction / Instagram)
