The Biggest Takeaways From The 'hannah Montana 20th Anniversary Special'

Enter: Gary Marsh, nan erstwhile president of Disney Channels Worldwide.

“I had this nutty ambition that we could move a fictional popular prima into a real-life superstar,” Marsh told Cyrus and her mother, Tish Cyrus, backstage.

Marsh publication to nan Cyruses nan email he sent to executives, successful which he said he wanted to “pull nan trigger” connected Cyrus, a no-name from Tennessee who he admitted was a “risk.”

It worked.

The then-sixth grader didn't want it "that bad," Cyrus said. But she knew she could sing, she knew she could dance, and she was good pinch nan blond wig. So she hopped connected a level to LAX and nan remainder was history.

Putting connected nan wig felt normal, Cyrus recalled, remembering really she turned into Montana instantly.

Cyrus was paired pinch actors Mitchel Musso and Emily Osment, who rounded retired nan champion friend trio that was cardinal to nan show.

Disney Channel legends

Cyrus was not nan only prima exploding connected Disney Channel erstwhile "Hannah Montana" entered nan mix.

There was Raven-Symoné, Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato, Dylan and Cole Sprouse, nan formed of "High School Musical," and galore much stars who became acquainted faces of nan Disney-verse.

"Hannah Montana" helped tie successful moreover much prima power.

Taylor Swift, for example, was successful nan “Hannah Montana” movie arsenic she was jump-starting her career, and she wrote Montana’s finale opus successful nan film, “You’ll Always Find Your Way Back Home.”

Miley Cyrus pinch "Hannah Montana" co-stars astatine nan day typical premiere successful Los Angeles connected Monday.Amy Sussman / Getty Images

Thanks to that era, Cyrus said she has been minted arsenic a "Disney Legend," which comes pinch a parking spot whenever she's connected nan lot. She said that's her favourite perk.

'Home, saccharine home'

Throughout nan special, Cyrus toured nan once-famous group and flipped done Stewart's iconic rotating closet, pulling looks from passim nan years pinch her mom arsenic nan brace recalled erstwhile she wore each outfit.

Cyrus' father, Billy Ray Cyrus, who besides played her dada successful nan show, joined for an interview. The celebrated father-daughter duo talked astir really moreover though it wasn't, it felt for illustration nan show was written for them.

"It was creation imitating life imitating art," Billy Ray Cyrus said. "And you were ever Miley to me."

Gomez besides made a impermanent quality connected nan special, arsenic she and Cyrus laughed complete their roles arsenic competing popular stars successful 1 section of "Hannah Montana."

Chappell Roan — who grew up watching "Hannah Montana" — showed up connected set, arsenic well.

"You virtually walked truthful I tin run," Roan told Cyrus.

Finding herself again

The extremity of "Hannah Montana" sees nan prima hanging up nan wig to modulation retired of this shape of life and backmost to her life arsenic a normal teen.

But making that transition, successful existent life too, "wasn't ever easy," Cyrus recalled.

"I utilized to deliberation of Hannah arsenic thing abstracted from myself. I would deliberation of, arsenic a character, moreover though it was me, I ever would think, 'What would beryllium champion for Hannah?' And I didn't ever deliberation astir that arsenic if we were integrated," Cyrus told nan fan-packed room wherever she performed immoderate of Montana's biggest hits. "And what I'm loving astir this typical is that it's my benignant of reclaiming, of merging, Hannah and Miley together."

It took Cyrus immoderate clip to find retired who she was without Montana.

"I emotion being Hannah, I emotion being Miley Cyrus, I emotion my personas, but what I'm astir proud of is who I americium arsenic a person," Cyrus told Cooper.

"I'm proud that that's ever stayed true. That what I've done has ever travel from a bosom first. It's ever been astir making nan world a amended spot from what I tin offer," she added.

The typical closed pinch Cyrus performing a caller song, "Younger You."

"Everyone has a imagination of wanting to consciousness loved, and I've ever felt it ... particularly from nan millions of people," Cyrus said. "But to acquisition it now, and imagining what my adjacent 20 years mightiness look like, is going to beryllium truthful different than it did connected a TV show. But again, truthful overmuch of it will hopefully beryllium nan same."