Sarah Michelle Gellar Asserts She Will Not Return for I Know What You Did Last Summer Reboot: ‘I Am Dead’ (Exclusive)

Sarah Michelle Gellar knows dead means dead.

In an exclusive conversation with PEOPLE as she partners with Philosophy to promote the brand’s Ultimate Miracle Worker Face & Neck Cream, the actress, 47, asserts she will not star in the I Know What You Did Last Summer reboot.

“I am dead,” Gellar says, referring to her character Helen Shivers, who died in the 1997 horror film.

Still, with her husband, Freddie Prinze Jr., set to reprise his role in the upcoming project, Gellar admits that she will play a small part — even if it’s just behind-the-scenes and “unofficial.”

“My best friend [Jennifer Kaytin Robinson] is directing it, so we joke that I have an unofficial job, which is I am continuity,” she explains. “So I’m always the one telling her, ‘Well, that would happen, or that wouldn’t happen with those characters,’ so I do have kind of an unofficial job title.”

I Know What You Did Last Summer follows a group of four friends who must survive a hook-wielding killer who stalks them after they accidentally kill a man.

Alongside Gellar and Prinze Jr., 48, the film also stars Jennifer Love Hewitt and Ryan Phillippe in lead roles.

The original film is based on the 1973 novel of the same name and was accompanied by a direct sequel, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, which was released in 1998.

Years later, in 2006, a reboot was released, and then a television series on Prime Video premiered back in 2021.

Prinze Jr. is currently slated to reprise his role of Ray Bronson in the reboot, and Hewitt, 45, is in talks to return as well.

Rounding out the new cast, Variety reported, are Madelyn Cline, Chase Sui Wonders, Jonah Haur-King, Sarah Pidgeo and Tyriq Withers. Camila Mendes was initially tapped for the film but exited due to scheduling conflicts.

“Jen’s put together such an amazing cast, and I’m so happy and excited for all of them,” Gellar tells PEOPLE of the reboot. “I will be there with moral support behind the camera.”

As for whether or not she will pay tribute to the franchise — and support her husband — when the film is released, Gellar teases, “Well, I mean, my husband is in the movie, my best friend wrote and directed it, [so] I think there’s a pretty good chance I will go to that premiere.”

The I Know What You Did Last Summer reboot will be released in theaters on July 18, 2025.