The coming-of-age prequel series premieres July 1 on Prime Video.


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What, like it's hard?! When Reese Witherspoon saw Lexi Minetree's audition, she knew she had found her young Elle Woods.

Witherspoon's confidence in Minetree has only grown since she was cast. Elle, Prime Video's prequel series, which premieres on July 1, follows the eventual Harvard Law graduate during her teenage years in the '90s, as she's plucked from her lavish Los Angeles bubble and forced to relocate to grungy, rainy Seattle.

"She's such a bright light," Witherspoon said of Minetree during an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Monday. "We watched 3,000 videos of girls trying out to be Elle Woods and when I saw her video, it was like a lightning strike. She had my voice down; she had the mannerisms. She held her body a certain way."

Minetree also recreated Elle's iconic Harvard Law admissions video.

"It was that extra 10% that made her Elle Woods," Witherspoon, Elle's executive producer, said.

Below, Yahoo rounded up all the sweet things the Legally Blonde star has said about Minetree, from praising her performance to recognizing their uncanny likeness.

Minetree took Witherspoon's breath away
During Prime Video's "Elle World" event in New York on Monday, Witherspoon was quick to sing Minetree's praises.

"I have to tell you, when I saw Lexi Minetree in her video, it stopped me," Witherspoon tearfully said. "It took my breath away. She understood — I'm gonna cry again — she's just such an incredible person."

After deciding that Minetree had gotten the job, Witherspoon wanted to speak to her about the gravity of character and how much she means to so many people.

"I said, 'OK, well this is obviously incredible,' but I say, 'I wanna talk to her.' So we did a Zoom, and she didn't know she basically already got the job, but I was like, 'I want you to understand the responsibility of what this means to people. Little girls are gonna come up to you and it's like a massive responsibility,'" Witherspoon said.

Witherspoon on passing 'the pink torch' to Minetree
It was a no-brainer for Witherspoon: She was ready to pass "the pink torch" to Minetree.

"On top of being this incredibly disciplined, talented young woman, she has such a beautiful heart. And she told me things about her life and her family and things that just showed me her character," the Legally Blonde star said during the "Elle World" event. "I could not be more proud to pass the baton or the pink torch to Lexi Minetree as the new Elle Woods."

As Minetree told Cosmopolitan magazine, "Stepping into shoes that are enormous and pink and six inches tall can be scary," but she has Witherspoon to guide her through it.

"She has been so fantastic during this whole process," Minetree recently told Entertainment Tonight. "She is always checking in on me. She'll like, always send me little voice memos like, 'Don't forget to drink water and get rest!'"

An uncanny resemblance
After Witherspoon told Minetree — in person! — that she had gotten the part, the young actor called her mom to share the news.

"Y'all sound exactly alike," Minetree's mom said, to which Witherspoon replied, "Isn't it crazy? When I saw her tape, I was like, 'Are we the same person? This is so weird.'"

While chatting with Entertainment Tonight in 2025, Witherspoon also said of Minetree's likeness, "Oh my gosh, it's eerie, like staring into the past… so I'm really excited."

A perfect fit
When it came time to make her Tonight Show debut, Minetree channeled the OG Elle Woods in a dress worn — and owned! — by Witherspoon herself. Minetree's stylist, Witherspoon's longtime friend, reached out to The Morning Show star to see if she still had any dresses from the Legally Blonde era. To her surprise, she had the whole wardrobe.

"I have all the wardrobe in storage, so I sent her as many dresses as they wanted, and I said, 'Choose any dresses that you want for her!' and she put it on, and it fit perfectly," Witherspoon said on The Tonight Show.

"It's like Cinderella's slipper," Witherspoon added. "She was meant to be Elle Woods!"

Minetree ended up wearing Witherspoon's original hot pink Marc Jacobs dress from the Legally Blonde premiere in 2001.

"The craziest thing is that we didn't have to do any tailoring. It just fit perfectly 25 years later," Minetree told Marie Claire of the dress during the Elle premiere. "I was very honored that I got to do that. And the fact she kept that? I mean, I lose all my clothing, so I was impressed by that."

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