Reese Witherspoon went extra miles in search of Elle Woods in ‘Legally Blonde’ prequel

Reese Witherspoon had given everyone a free hand to find a new Elle Woods for the upcoming Legally Blonde prequel, Elle.

For those unaware, Witherspoon portrayed Elle in the 2001 comedy-romance film, which was based on Amanda Brown’s novel of the same name. Now, Lexi Minetree plays a high school version of Elle, whose life takes a dark turn when she leaves Bel-Air for Seattle, in the forthcoming prequel series, executive-produced by Witherspoon.

In a talk with PEOPLE, Lauren Neustadter, the executive producer of Elle, revealed that the 50-year-old American actress and producer was deeply involved in the show.

She said, “I mean, this whole show was her idea. And then we just sort of took it and ran with it.”

The 46-year-old film producer went on to share that Witherspoon “really wanted to do an open call” to find Elle, which was posted in September 2024.

Neustadter stated, “She really felt like the Elle Woods thing to do was give every young woman an opportunity to try out if they wanted to.”

“We got thousands and thousands of tapes. And Lexi really just popped for us,” she said, adding, “We have amazing casting directors on the show, and they sent us a bunch of the self-tapes, but Lexi was just exceptional from the start. Her slate was so funny.”

“She did the [Legally Blonde] Harvard admissions video, but her sort of spin on it, and then her reading was just incredible,” Neustadter gushed.

What Minetree “did amazing” was that she refrained from “mimicking” Witherspoon; rather, she worked on “channelling her,” as she “really honors the character in such a beautiful way.”

It is pertinent to mention that Elle is scheduled to be released with all eight episodes on Prime Video on July 1, 2026.