There are few actors as accomplished as Golden Globe-winning Reese Witherspoon. Most recently she starred and produced in the acclaimed Hulu miniseries Little Fires Everywhere, as well as taking the lead opposite Jennifer Aniston in the award-winning Apple TV drama, The Morning Show. A prolific actress, in 2019 she starred and co-produced in the award-winning international phenomenon Big Little Lies. Evidently, Witherspoon excels as much in front of the camera as she does behind it. Responsible for the success of such diverse films – from Legally Blonde to Wild – it’s no surprise she is one of Hollywood’s most respected actor-producers.

In this conversation, Witherspoon talks to HFPA journalist Margaret Gardiner about the many hats she wears and the impact her choices have made on the movie-going public. She says that the role as Elle Woods in Legally Blonde changed her life. “First of all, the script was lovely and I could just hear the characters voice the moment I read it. When I had the chance to play Elle Woods, I saw a similar path to a lot of Goldie Hawn’s characters. Goldie is my idol. And even now everywhere I go, young women stop me, young men stop me…all sorts of people talk about how they also felt underestimated, and a lot of them went to law school. It’s so humbling that your work could touch people’s lives like that, and I feel forever grateful to the people who gave me that job.” 

She knows that the transition from actress to producer isn’t as easy as it seems. “I had a lot of success as an actress, but I really wanted to try something…picking my own books and optioning them myself, and then finding screenwriters to adapt them and trying to find ways to not compromise the material.  It was scary, to be honest. I was self-funding everything, so I was obviously in a position of privilege, I could self-fund it, but it was terrifying to be responsible for five employees and not know if this venture was going to work.”

Listen to the podcast to learn about when her interest in acting came about; what it was like during her first flush of success as a teenager and how she coped being away from home; her experience as a woman in the business and being underestimated; her unrealized dreams of being a country and western singer; what it was like to win the Oscar and the Golden Globe for Best Actress for Walk the LineLittle Fires Everywhere and Big Little Lies