Reese Witherspoon Interview!
In How Do You Know, Reese Witherspoon plays a woman unlike any other character she’s portrayed. “My characters are usually very vocal. She was more interior,” Witherspoon said.
In writer-director James L. Brooks’ [Terms of Endearment, As Good As It Gets] new romantic comedy — starring Jack Nicholson, Paul Rudd and Owen Wilson — Reese Witherspoon portrays a champion softball player who is facing the possibility of being let go by the U.S. Olympic softball team because she is 31 years old.
Although her character is nowhere near ready to settle down, Witherspoon admitted to us that that aspect was part of the challenge as she is raising two children and also in a serious relationship.
Her How Do You Know character required not only training with the U.S. softball team, but also getting into the mindset of an athlete, one she compared to young actresses in Hollywood.
“I found it really interesting in that there’s a parallel to being an actor, especially as a woman. You get the feeling sometimes your clock is ticking,” Witherspoon said. “You can only hope to have the career of a Meryl Streep or Diane Keaton.”
If winning an Oscar for Walk the Line and the astounding body of work she has produced is any indication, we don’t think Reese Witherspoon has anything to worry about in terms of Hollywood longevity. She’s already well on her way to being the next Streep or Keaton.
As you might know, today is the day Reese’s new movie How Do You Know opens in US cinemas! It’s been a whole 2 years since we last saw Reese herself on the big screen, so it’s an exciting day for Reese fans. In the movie Ms Witherspoon plays Lisa, a professional softball player who has to decide between the two men in her life and what she wants to do with her life next. It sounds like a more grown-up romantic comedy from Reese, but is still sure to show off her usual charm.
Lisa’s athletic ability is the defining passion of her life, having been her focus since early childhood. When she is cut from her team, everything she has ever known is suddenly taken from her. George is a straight-arrow businessman who is accused of a financial crime, even though he’s done nothing wrong. Although he may be headed to jail, George’s honesty, integrity, and unceasing optimism may be his only path to keeping his sanity. George and Lisa meet on the worst day of each of their lives: she has just been cut, and he has just been served. When everything else seems to be falling apart, they will discover what it means to have something wonderful happen.
Visit the official site at www.howdoyouknow-movie.com. If you go and see the movie be sure to drop back in here and let us know what you thought of it!
To celebrate the US release, we have some gorgeous shiny new stills from How Do You Know in the Gallery.
– Movies > How Do You Know? > Stills
Reese Witherspoon, Paul Rudd, Owen Wilson and Jack Nicholson on “How Do You Know”
James L. Brooks has the best laugh in the business.
It sounds fake, like he’s actually pronouncing every “Ha Ha Ha.” But it’s so hearty and infectious, it has to be genuine. Even when several people are laughing at once, its Brooks’ chuckle that rises above the fray.
And there was a good amount of laughter from the press corps and the celebrities being interviewed during a recent New York event for Brooks’ latest, “How Do You Know.” The cast – which includes Reese Witherspoon, Paul Rudd, Owen Wilson, Kathryn Hahn and Jack Nicholson – accompanied their director to Manhattan to meet with gathered journalists and discuss Brooks’ latest romantic comedy.
The first question was a true softball, even for a film about a softball player (Witherspoon) who is between athletic gigs and committed boyfriends. One female journalist asked the celebrity panel how they’re supposed to know when they’re in love.
“It has been too long ago for me to remember,” Nicholson chimed in, breaking up the panel and the room.
Brooks took the question a little more seriously. “I had a line that I believed so much in that I threw it in, but I eventually took it out of the movie. Paul was going to say that it’s when you are more yourself then you ever thought possible.”
Continue reading this entry »
Softball Know-How Takes Four Former Ivy Leaguers To The Silver Screen
In James L. Brooks’ latest movie, “How Do You Know,” Reese Witherspoon stars as a former professional softball player named Lisa Jorgenson, who is caught up in a love triangle of sorts with George (Paul Rudd) and Matty (Owen Wilson). Romantic comedy ensues, as you may expect from a James L. Brooks film.
But what you may not have expected is that five people with Ivy League softball ties were a part of the filmmaking process, including former Penn Quakers Christina Khosravi ’08 and Kaelin Ainley ’07, one-time Princeton Tiger Kathryn Welch ’09, as well as former Columbia Lion Keli Leong ’09. Also taking part was current Harvard assistant coach Carri Leto Martin.
The quartet of former Ivy League players combined for 11 All-Ivy honors in their careers, including five All-Ivy First Team nods, so it is easy to envision how they could be useful when filming a softball scene or two.
In fact, Khosravi was named the Ivy League Player of the Year in 2006, while Welch earned Rookie of the Year honors. Khosravi went on to earn Co-Player of the Year honors in 2008 and remains one of just five Ivy softball players to have earned multiple Ivy League Player of the Year honors.
“To see that woman’s softball is getting the recognition it deserves is a testament to how hard both former and current players are working in building the image of not only softball but woman’s sports as a whole,” Khosravi stated. “It was awesome to see the time and effort it takes to film just a 30-second scene, to be on set with the director and to hear how direction is given and taken.”
Continue reading this entry »
‘How Do You Know’ Star Reese Witherspoon Recalls Softball ‘Crash Course’
‘I’m not a ringer or anything,’ she tells MTV News of her newfound skills.
Because director James L. Brooks has only made six films in his career, most actors jump at the chance to work with him — as was the case when Brooks approached Reese Witherspoon for a role in the upcoming romantic comedy “How Do You Know.”
“[It was] incredibly flattering and terrifying at the same time,” Witherspoon told MTV News recently regarding her reaction to Brooks’ initial interest. “When he called me, I was like, ‘He wants to meet me? And do what?’ We sat down, and he said, ‘I want to write this character, and I want you to play it.’ And I was like, ‘Great!’ And he said, ‘I want you to be a professional softball player. Do you play softball?’
” ‘Yes, of course I do!’ ” Witherspoon recalled responding — but she admitted to MTV News in a whisper: “No, I don’t play softball. But I learned. I did a crash course with the UCLA Bruins, and they taught me. Three hours a day for four months. They really helped.”
Given the fact that there’s not much of Witherspoon’s character playing softball in the film, we wondered what motivated her to commit to such extensive training.
As a big holiday release, there are a lot of reviews for How Do You Know being written out there! I’m not going to post a lot of them here – you can search on Google for “How Do You Know” reviews – but below are a selection that I found interesting. A lot of the reviews aren’t too positive about the film, but many of them still have nice things to say about Reese!
film review—HOW DO YOU KNOW
If you admire such films as Broadcast News, Terms of Endearment, and As Good as it Gets, as I do, you’ll be rooting for James L. Brooks to score another bull’s-eye with his latest effort. But it’s clear pretty early on that How Do You Know is a muddled misfire: a tiresome, talky romantic comedy about a bright young woman who, at a vulnerable moment in her life, can’t decide between two men—neither of whom seems terribly appealing. That these three characters are played by Reese Witherspoon, Owen Wilson and Paul Rudd makes it even more disheartening. Worst of all, Jack Nicholson, who has given some of his best performances in Brooks’ movies, tries to negotiate an unplayable role as Rudd’s unsympathetic, self-absorbed father.
I could try to describe the story—as I started to do in a first draft of this review—but it would be a waste of your time and mine. Brooks establishes the traits and quirks of his three main characters and then has them do things that make no sense. The one constant throughout the film is the amount of talk that emanates from their lips; in fact, they don’t ever shut up.
Continue reading this entry »
Today I have added screencaps from the Today Show interview, plus a few entertainment news show reports from the premiere of How Do You Know. Screencaps from Reese interviews are always great because she is so animated and expressive! Big thanks go to Brianne for videos from the TV reports. The TV reports just feature snippets from the full interviews posted online, which can be found here by browing back through our recent updates.
HD caps from Letterman, plus more photos from the How Do You Know premiere coming this weekend!
– TV & Interviews > News Segments > Reports from 2010 > ET – December 14th 2010 (Online)
– TV & Interviews > News Segments > Reports from 2010 > ET – December 14th 2010 (TV)
– TV & Interviews > News Segments > Reports from 2010 > ET – December 15th 2010 (TV)
– TV & Interviews > News Segments > Reports from 2010 > Extra – December 14th 2010 (TV)
– TV & Interviews > News Segments > Reports from 2010 > Extra – December 14th 2010 (Online)
– TV & Interviews > Talk Shows > Talk Shows from 2010 > The Today Show – December 6th 2010
A Breakdown of How Do You Know for Rom-Com Purists
The critics have not been kind to How Do You Know, the first James L. Brooks film since the similarly misbegotten Spanglish. “This wrong-headed dramedy peddles forced warm-fuzziness and insincere sentiment on the backs of an all-star cast,” wrote Variety’s Peter Debruge, while Indiewire’s Anne Thompson noted, “This is a career disaster for Reese Witherspoon, an Oscar-winning actress who has stumbled since Walk the Line and needs a flop like a hole in the head.” Okay, sure, but this is a romantic comedy, right? We expect a certain degree of not-so-goodness already — the question is, can we work with this? Luckily, Vulture is happy to oblige you with a breakdown of all the rom-com boxes How Do You Know manages to check off, so that if you’re wondering what the movie has to offer, you can at least answer its titular question.
Rom-Com Subgenre
A Love Triangle (see: The Philadelphia Story) about a woman who must Choose Between the Dim-Bulb Blond and Neurotic Jewish Man (see: Broadcast News)Credentials
Writer-director James L. Brooks (Terms of Endearment, Broadcast News, and As Good As It Gets, but also Spanglish); early-aughts rom-com queen Reese Witherspoon (Legally Blonde, Sweet Home Alabama); Owen Wilson (Wedding Crashers, Marley & Me); Paul Rudd (yes, there’s Object of My Affection and all the Apatow films, but Clueless is obviously the be-all, end-all); and Jack Nicholson (Something’s Gotta Give, As Good As It Gets).Continue reading this entry »
The Morning Show (2019)
