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Hilary Duff Wears a Blue Jays Jersey and Eats Rogers Centre Hot Dogs At Sold-Out Toronto Concert
It’s not always easy for a nostalgic artist to make a successful comeback, but Duff’s return has been a major moment. As Kelly Clarkson’s “Since U Been Gone” — an homage to a fellow Y2K hitmaker — faded out, the opening chords of Duff’s hit “Wake Up” overtook the waterfront venue. After a couple of minutes of the crowd anxiously awaiting Duff, she appeared on the pink carpeted stage, launching into one of her biggest hits, followed by 2003’s “So Yesterday.”
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“Thank you for braving this rain with me tonight,” Duff said. “I love this venue so much. I got to see you guys walking in over that bridge today,” she said, pointing to the Ontario Place bridge that leads into the venue. “My dressing room was facing it.”
Duff shared that she was in the city earlier this year, playing a much smaller room on her intimate Small Room, Big Nerves tour, performing for the 2,500-person audience at History. “We’ve gotten a lot bigger in size,” she said, referencing the RBC Amphitheatre’s 16,000 capacity. Duff actually played this same venue over two decades ago, under its former name, Molson Amphitheatre, in 2006.
It’s clear that she has shed the “big nerves” she once feared pretty quickly, as she confidently balanced her past hits with new tracks like “Roommates” and “Weather for Tennis” from 2026’s Luck... Or Something. During “Holiday Party,” a song about the woes of being a married woman in her thirties, the bar in the background was named “Lizzie’s.” Duff continued to pay homage to her Disney Channel days, recreating the infamous “You’re watching Disney Channel” gesture with a drumstick before throwing it into the crowd.
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Hilary Duff at RBC Amphitheatre in Toronto on Aug. 12, 2026.Gabriel Di Sante
Even if the crowd didn’t know all the words to her newer material, Duff expressed gratitude for the generosity of listeners who tuned into her first album in almost a decade. “You really showed up,” she said, which was especially true in Canada, where Luck…Or Something debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Canadian Albums chart.
Still, when she sang 2007’s “With Love " — Duff’s highest-charting track on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100 — everyone got up from their seats. The song has become a meme after a late 2000s performance of Duff went viral, with many fans recreating the dance moves from the clip. While Duff admitted that she was embarrassed by it, she has learned to embrace it.
“Who’s ready to do this dance in 6ix?” Duff asked before she picked a lucky group of people from the crowd to join her on-stage, a standout moment of Duff’s new shows. It was a mish-mash of bodies on-stage, but it’s not often that you get to dance with one of your childhood idols.
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The throwback moments of Duff’s set never failed to amp up the crowd. During one of her costume changes, a montage of Duff’s early career moments flashed on-screen. When she sang “Anywhere But Here,” a fan favourite from 2003’s Metamorphosis, it felt like a heartfelt message to the fans that she would rather be here, in this moment with the crowd.
Duff continued to dip in and out of the past, but notably sprang back into the present with the crowd towards the end of her set. An olive green couch was added to her on-stage set, as she sauntered onto stage to lie down on it, wearing baggy jeans and a Toronto Blue Jays jersey — she performed “We Don’t Talk,” a track about her estranged relationship with her sister, Haylie.
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The singer explained significance of wearing the classic Joe Carter jersey, which belonged to one of her crew members. “It’s a vintage 1993 jersey,” she said, before waxing poetic about Toronto’s recent baseball achievements. Her connections to Canada are organic, including her management led by Darren Gilmore at Watchdog Management.
She introduced a segment of her show she called “Wine O’Clock,” which she explained was when she sipped a glass of wine and had a surprise treat relevant to the city she was performing in. Fitting with her jersey, she was presented with two hot dogs — a maple bacon jumbo hot dog and a classic Loony dog — bought from Rogers Centre, home of the Blue Jays. It was a wholesome moment that was rooted in the present, during a concert filled with much nostalgia.
Before she sang her set’s penultimate track, “Mature,” it became crystal clear why Duff is one of the few childhood stars who has made it through the emotional rollercoaster of being famous unscathed — she has been grounded in lifelong support from her family, friends, and, of course, her fans. It was only right to close out her hour-and-a-half set with “What Dreams Are Made Of,” as fans celebrated their younger years with one of the artists who helped shape them.
Duff will play a second show at RBC Amphitheatre tonight (Aug. 13). She’ll return to Canada in 2027, playing in 10 cities across the country, including Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg, Hamilton, Montreal and more.
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