Entertainment

Reese Witherspoon reveals actress cast as Elle Woods for Legally Blonde prequel

Witherspoon, 48, starred in the hit 2001 comedy with Jennifer Coolidge and Luke Wilson.

Reese Witherspoon starred in Legally Blonde
Reese Witherspoon starred in Legally Blonde (Ian West/PA)

Reese Witherspoon has revealed the identity of the actress cast as a young Elle Woods for a new Legally Blonde prequel series.

US actress Witherspoon, 48, starred as the character in the hit 2001 comedy and its 2003 sequel and serves as an executive producer on the Prime Video series.

On Thursday, in a video shared to Instagram, Witherspoon could be seen giving feedback to the actress Lexi Minetree after her audition for the role.

She said: “I wanted to say your audition tape was amazing, as we talked about, we had to make a really hard decision the other day, and we wanted to tell you in person because you’ve just worked really hard.

“And we just wanted to tell you that you don’t have to audition any more because you got the part, you’re Elle Woods.”

Minetree began to cry before calling her mother to tell her she had got the part.

The social media post was captioned: “Allow me to introduce you to the new Elle Woods!

“After watching so many incredible auditions for the new Elle prequel series on @PrimeVideo, we finally found our Elle. And today, I got to break the news myself!”.

The series will be called Elle and will meet the character before the events of Legally Blonde, which sees sorority girl Woods gain admittance to Harvard Law School in pursuit of a boyfriend who has broken up with her.

While studying there, Woods discovers she is more than just her looks and proves to have the makings of a highly capable lawyer.

The new series is produced by Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine company, which is now part of Candle Media, and was previously responsible for shows including Daisy Jones And The Six.