Hayley Kiyoko’s ‘Girls Like Girls’ Finds Its Stars
With her directorial debut, Kiyoko brings ‘Girls Like Girls’ to the big screen, reimagined with a new cast.
Ten years after a viral music video turned a quiet queer love story into a cultural anthem, Hayley Kiyoko’s Girls Like Girls is headed to the big screen. And rising stars Maya da Costa and Myra Molloy are officially leading the charge.
The long-anticipated feature film adaptation, produced by Focus Features and directed by Kiyoko herself, marks a major new chapter for the story. What began as a three-minute visual for a breakout pop single has now evolved into a bestselling novel, a screenwriting collaboration, and soon, a full-length movie.
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Da Costa will play Coley, a character familiar to fans of the original 2015 video, which follows a tense and tender teen romance set against the backdrop of early-2000s suburbia. Molloy steps into the role of Sonya, the girl who captures Coley’s heart, and who must navigate her own identity while entangled in a toxic relationship with a boyfriend who won’t let go.
“The film tells the universal story of falling in love for the first time and learning to accept yourself along the way,” according to the movie’s official description.
Da Costa is known for her recent performance in Hulu’s Under the Bridge, and Molloy brings experience from projects like He’s All That, The Bold Type, and Halfworlds. For Kiyoko, who’s spent years building the Girls Like Girls universe across music, literature, and now film, this moment is hard-won.
The journey has been anything but simple. “I have never fought so hard for anything in my life,” Kiyoko wrote on Instagram when the film was first announced. “The tears, the setbacks, the sacrifices, the closed doors, the immense struggle to get a film made is another story in itself.”
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But the story has already proven to be powerful. Since its debut, the “Girls Like Girls” video has racked up more than 159 million views on YouTube. The original music video featured Stefanie Scott as Coley and Kelsey Chow as Sonya. Scott returns to the project as Kiyoko’s co-writer for the feature-length screenplay.
“As a community, we know how rare it is to see representation that truly reflects our experiences — and even rarer for it to be fully supported in film and TV,” Kiyoko told Out in December. “I can’t wait for the world to see this story. I hope it inspires people to believe in queer joy and chase their dreams, no matter how long it takes. Nine years later… we did it.”
From a self-funded music video to a feature with a full production team, Girls Like Girls is proof of what can happen when queer creators have the persistence to keep going until they’re given the chance to tell their own stories.
The film doesn’t have a release date yet, but if Kiyoko’s decade-long journey is any indication, it’s going to be worth the wait.
