Disney+ Will Abscond with 'The Stolen Girl'

It's been a rough decade for the entertainment industry. It first shut down in 2020 due to the pandemic, then was hobbled by the streaming wars as it tried to recover, only to have the twin writer and actor strikes derail most of 2023. At this point, the number of shows announced only to get canceled (or disappear into the ether) is starting to rival those that get made. That certainly seemed to be the fate of Playdate, initially announced in 2023 for Disney+ U.K. However, the series didn't actually disappear; the production just changed the series title to The Stolen Girl.

Changing the names of shows mid-production is nothing new; usually, there's a good reason for it. Until I Kill You, for example, changed from Delia Balmer when producers realized Americans had no idea who she was. Sally Wainwright changed her series from Hot Flush to Riot Women for much the same reason — Americans call them Hot Flashes, not Hot Flushes.

In the case of Playdate, the initial title was taken from the source material, Alex Dahl's 2018 novel of the same name. But while Americans also use the word "playdate" when talking about young children visiting each other's houses, in the U.S., it connotes toddlers or infants where plans are made well in advance. That is the opposite of the situation at the story's heart, which begins when two elementary school-aged girls who become BFFs at school beg their mothers to let them have a sleepover one evening.