Full House cast recalls Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen's scene decisions

The showrunners of Full House occasionally faced double the trouble because Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen shared the role of Michelle Tanner. On their podcast, How Rude, Tanneritos!, Andrea Barber and Jodie Sweetin candidly discussed how it was chosen which of the fraternal twins would star as the youngest Tanner daughter.

“When they were little, it was the ice cream scenes that they would always squabble over,” Sweetin reminisced, adding, “because they both wanted to do it, so they’d have to trade off, like, ‘You can do it this time, and you can do it next time.’”

Certain scenes proved a little more difficult, such as the 1993 Full House family vacation at Disney World, which spanned two episodes. As part of the plot, the two youngest Tanner sisters, Stephanie and Michelle, dressed up as Disney princesses and were featured on floats in the theme park’s renowned parade.

“I’m sure Adria [Later] made it fair,” Barber stated, referring to the on-set teacher who was often called “the Michelle wrangler.” “I’m sure there was something equivalent that she offered the other twin who didn’t ride on the float. I don’t know how they decided who got to go… maybe whoever was behaving well that day?”

Sweetin, who got to dress as Cinderella for the scene alongside Michelle as Snow White, noted that it wasn’t that simple since the Olsen twins were just 6 years old at the time. “We had to have costumes created and things like that,” she explained. “So, you know, a decision had to be made somewhat in advance.”

Because of the massive size of the cast—which included the four Tanners, Danny’s girlfriend Vicky (Gail Edwards), D.J.’s boyfriend Steve (Scott Weinger), best friend Kimmy Gibbler (Barber), Joey (Dave Coulier), Uncle Jesse (John Stamos), Aunt Becky (Lori Loughlin), and their twins—the parade required several Disney-themed floats.

More than thirty years later, the actresses’ recollections of who was where during filming were a little fuzzy. Barber recalled being on the Minnie Mouse float dressed like Carmen Miranda, a nod to The Three Caballeros, the 1944 live-action animated movie starring Aurora Miranda. Meanwhile, Sweetin couldn’t quite remember which twin was on the Disney princess float with her. “I wanna say it was Ashley,” she pondered. “No, maybe it was Mary-Kate. I’d have to go back and see.” (According to behind-the-scenes footage, it was Mary-Kate.)

The only time Mary-Kate and Ashley appeared on screen together as separate characters was in the season 5 episode “The Devil Made Me Do It.” In the episode, there was no mistaking the two, as Ashley played “Bad Michelle” debating her punishment with Mary-Kate’s “Good Michelle” after the 5-year-old was reprimanded for messing with Uncle Jesse’s musical instruments.