MJH: I think it was a little bit of both. How much of your personality influenced your character, or how much of Clarissa influenced you? RM: In the early 90s you starred in the Nickelodeon show, Clarissa Explains It All as a smart, sarcastic teenage girl that addressed the audience directly. I relished every moment of it and invited friends along for the ride. It was well aware what I was handed and given. I tried for seven years and I still plan on going back to graduate someday. I didn’t get to continue through school and finish because then Sabrina came along, but I kept trying.

I was afraid if I put off college once, I’d put it off again and again, so I agonized over it for about a week, but ultimately decided that I would go shoot the movie and start in January. It was one of those moments where I questioned, “Do I follow this career path that has been started for me?” or, “Do I do the normal thing, which is the next progression of the rite of passage and a part of growing up ?” – An experience that most people don’t want to miss. But then I got offered a job where I would have to take a month and go to Florida, right when I was supposed to start my first semester. So I had my heart set on college and there was no way I was not going to go to college. My parents didn’t really go to college, but somehow we were raised to think that after high school you go to college and after that you get a job. It was more like this-is-what-you-do-after-high-school. College was never really a choice growing up. There were a few crossroads in my career where I asked myself, “Do I want to do this?” or, “Do I do something else?” One big was deciding whether I should go to college. Melissa Joan Hart: I’m still trying to figure out what I am going to do when I grow up. When did you decide it would be your career, versus something that your family got you involved with that you happened to be talented in?

Risen Magazine: You have basically been acting since you were a toddler. Interviewed exclusively for Risen Magazine She talked with the magazine about her career, her faith and a city-themed children’s clothing line that she and her husband recently launched. In between her popcorn making and the arrival of her older kids coming home, Hart didn’t miss a beat. So when Risen called Melissa Joan Hart for their preset interview, she graciously kept the appointment in spite of the snow day she was in the midst of with preschoolers at her house. Script changes, scene set-ups and personality disputes are often part of the territory. It’s pretty fair to say that people in show business have the acumen to go-with-the-flow.

Joan the snow witch