'Halloweentown' star Kimberly J. Brown is keeping Debbie Reynold's legacy alive

In the summer of 1998, fans gathered in the small town of St. Helens, Ore., hoping to see legendary actress Debbie Reynolds filming the Disney Channel Original Movie “Halloweentown.”

During her short breaks, Reynolds would stroll over to the crowd and say, “Hello, I’m Princess Leia’s mom,” we’re told. She was known to chat with the fans and always thank them for coming by to watch.

“She made it a point to tell us as kids, ‘Always make time for fans and say hello.’ That has stuck with me over the years,” Kimberly J. Brown, who starred in the movie as Marnie Piper, the granddaughter of Reynolds’ character, told Page Six in an interview earlier this month. “She appreciated the ability to entertain and make people happy, so she taught me what a gift that was to be able to do that for people.”

Brown, now 34, was 13 years old when she landed the role of Marnie, a teenager who learns she descends from a long line of witches. Hardly a stranger to the acting world, Brown performed in her first Broadway show at age 7 (“Four Baboons Adoring the Sun”), and was coming off the soap opera “Guiding Light” when she stepped into Marnie’s shoes.

At the time, Brown says she knew who Reynolds was, but had only seen “Singin’ in the Rain.” Ahead of filming, her father bought her “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” — for which Reynolds was nominated for an Oscar — to watch.

“When you hear you’re going to work with a legend of that magnitude, you never know how this person’s going to be,” Brown says. “But she was the opposite of any kind of stigma. She was warm and gracious and it was such a good example to work with somebody like that and have her impact me so much not only professionally, but personally over the years.”

The first “Halloweentown” was filmed in Oregon for around five weeks in the summer of 1998. Brown recounts stories including one about Robin Thomas, who plays the movie’s villain Kalabar, being taken to a local doctor after blowing out his vocal cord during the confrontation scene at the end of the film. She also tells us how Reynolds (Aggie Cromwell) used to write all her lines for each day on yellow legal pads because the print was too small on the script copies.

The flick was the fourth to be branded as a “Disney Channel Original Movie” and was successful enough to be granted a sequel in 2001, which was filmed in Vancouver during the winter that year.

It was the day she flew up to Canada that Brown, who was by then 16, first met Daniel Kountz. Kountz played the sequel’s new villain, Kal, and would, years later, become Brown’s boyfriend in real life.

“It didn’t even cross my mind,” Brown tells us when we asked if she’d had a crush on him back then. “He was in a serious relationship … We got along great, had a lot of fun and he was sweet and everything, but it just, we never went there.”

In 2016, Kountz and Brown reunited to make a YouTube video about where his “Halloweentown” character would be today.

“Things kind of slowly turned romantic, which was completely unexpected for both of us because neither of us were looking,” Brown says, adding that she when she posted a photo of them kissing in July 2018, she had no idea the internet would flip out the way it did.

“All of a sudden it was just everywhere … and I was like, ‘What!?’ … It was amazing to us that it became prominent in the news for a minute,” she says.

Now, two years after they started dating, Brown says marriage is a “delightful possibility,” but “they’re very happy and sort of enjoying that right now.”

The “Halloweentown” series had four films in total. Brown returned for “Halloweentown High,” the third installment, but was replaced by actress Sara Paxton in the fourth, “Return to Halloweentown.”

“Ultimately … it’s a decision that came down to Disney and I don’t know specifically,” she says of why she wasn’t asked to be part of it.

Over the years, the rumor was that Brown’s schedule prohibited her from being in the movie, but she has stated multiple times that was not the case.

When reached by Page Six on Monday, “Return to Halloweentown” director David Jackson told us, “The character she played was younger than the actress actually was by enough years that we felt like as a collective group that it was better to recast someone who was younger. It kind of came down to that.”

He adds that Disney also felt the fans who watched the earlier movies had also aged out of watching them and that the fourth movie, which followed Marnie and her brother Dylan in college, wasn’t reliant on the first three installments.

Jackson has no regrets about the decision to recast the role with Paxton, who was 18 at the time, three years younger than Brown.

“[Paxton] was great and wonderful to work with and I felt like she had a young spirit that the story needed,” he says.

However, Brown tells us that even Reynolds once said in an interview that she was confused about the change.

“I don’t want to put words in her mouth, but I don’t think she necessarily agreed with it,” she says, adding, “She was always a champion of mine while we were shooting and always supported me and lifted me up.”

The role of Dylan, played by Joey Zimmerman, was not recast for the final film.

Reynolds passed away on Dec. 28, 2016 at age 84, one day after her daughter Carrie Fisher died.

“The last time I saw her I brought some people with me to see her show in Hollywood,” Brown recalls.

The last story Brown shares about Reynolds is that on Halloween for many years, the famed actress would wear her Aggie costume and surprise young trick-or-treaters who happened to be lucky enough to knock on her door.

“So many people ask me about her and I share as much as I can,” Brown explains. “I think it’s a good reminder that somebody of that stature made such an impact in trying to be as kind and supportive as they could. I think thats such an important thing to impart on people.”

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