Low-rise jeans are back, and apparently so is Laguna Beach.
At a press event for their 20th-anniversary reunion, Lauren Conrad, Stephen Colletti, and Talan Torriero posted a TikTokon March 28 participating in the ‘Dracula‘ strut trend, a hallway walk set to a high-energy JENNIE remix. The clip looks like outtake footage from 2004, and the internet treated it accordingly. Within hours it had racked up millions of views.
For the millennial audience that spent Tuesday nights debating Team Lauren versus Team Kristin, seeing the core trio back together (and arguably looking barely different from their teenage selves) delivers exactly the payoff needed after years of ‘where are they now’ speculation. But the video isn’t only working on that crowd. A new generation has been finding the show on streaming platforms, and the strut dropped at precisely the right moment to bridge those two audiences.
It’s also well-timed promotion. The reunion special, The Reunion: Laguna Beach, premieres on The Roku Channel on April 10, the first time the original cast has gathered for a televised retrospective in twenty years. The special is expected to cover the behind-the-scenes mechanics of the beach parties, the manufactured and not-so-manufactured love triangles, and the production decisions that helped invent the modern docusoap format. Kristin Cavallari, absent from the viral clip, is confirmed as both executive producer and participant.
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What the strut video gets right is something a lot of celebrity nostalgia efforts miss. A polished red carpet appearance would have generated a headline and a few comments. A deliberately goofy TikTok trend can generate more authentic fun and engagement. Fans respond to former stars who are willing to look a little ridiculous alongside them rather than above them. These were teenagers doing awkward, human things on camera, and twenty years later the approach still translates.
Reality television has produced dozens of reunion specials, many of them forgettable. Whether Laguna Beach can sustain the momentum of one well-executed clip through an entire special remains the actual question. But the early evidence suggests the audience is there, ready to show up.
This story was originally published by Parade on Mar 28, 2026, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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