Reese Witherspoon was told to 'dress sexy' to land her part in Legally Blonde after a studio head thought she was a 'shrew'
Resse Witherspoon, during a recent interview, opened up about the struggles she had to face two decades ago when she was a newbie in the industry. She was reportedly suggested "to dress sexy" to land a role and almost lost a part in a film because a studio head thought she was a "shrew" based on a character she had played in a previous film.
The 43-year-old 'Big Little Lies' star, while talking to The Hollywood Reporter for its Women in Entertainment issue, revealed that her character Tracy Flick in the 1999 comedy 'Election', which portrayed her as a manipulative high school student, initially dissuaded an entertainment executive from considering her for a role in the 2001 film 'Legally Blonde'.
"My manager finally called and said, 'You've got to go meet with the studio head because he will not approve you. He thinks you really are your character from Election and that you're repellent,'' the Oscar-winner told the outlet. "And then I was told to dress sexy for the meeting," she added.
The actress said that she could not put off the suggestion made by her manager because of the standards of the time, and financial considerations.
"You’re 23, you have a baby at home, you need the money and you’re being told that by people who know what they’re doing," said Witherspoon, who has a daughter and two sons. "It's funny to think of all the things we were told to do back then because now you're thinking, 'Oh God, if somebody told my daughter to do that, she'd be like, I really hope you're joking.'"
The actress, an active member of the #MeToo and Time's Up movements, has been involved in the drive to reform Hollywood from a culture of sexual harassment and misconduct.
"I don't want to just admire problems, and I certainly don't want to leave this business the same way that I found it," she told the outlet.
