Legally Blonde 2: Red, White and Blonde
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| Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde | |
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| Directed by | Charles Herman-Wurmfeld |
| Produced by | Marc E. Platt David Nicksay |
| Written by | Amanda Brown (novel) Kate Kondell (screenplay) |
| Starring | Reese Witherspoon |
| Distributed by | MGM |
| Release date(s) | July 2, 2003 (USA) |
| Running time | 95 min. |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $45,000,000 |
| Preceded by | Legally Blonde |
| IMDb profile | |
Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde, is the 2003 sequel to 2001's Legally Blonde. It was once again produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and again starred Reese Witherspoon as Elle, as well as Luke Wilson, Sally Field, Regina King, Bruce McGill, and Bob Newhart. In the UK, the film is titled Legally Blonde 2: Bigger, Bolder and Blonder.
Even though the movie took place in Washington DC, the movie was filmed in the offices at the Delta Center, and the Utah State Capitol in Salt Lake City, Utah and the Illinois State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois. The supposed "aerial views" in the movie on Washington DC buildings were scale models built by the crew.
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[edit] Plot
In Legally Blonde 2, Elle wants her Chihuahua, Bruiser, to reunite with his mother, because she would like Bruiser's mother to be in attendance at her wedding. The lawyer then hires a detective for the task and she discovers that the company that has her dog's mother is a cosmetics producer that uses the dog for cosmetic testing. She goes to the board of the firm where she works and finds out that they represent that company and refuse to do anything about it. Elle argues that this is unjust and is fired from her law firm.
Elle decides to leave Boston, where she had settled with her fiance, and move to Washington, DC. Elle is so upset that her dog's mother is in a make-up testing laboratory, that she decides to take it upon herself to have a "voice for those who can't speak", in other words, she wants to make animal testing against the law. She then tries to convince Congress to ban all animal testing, but she is met with deaf ears.
While working on the campaign, she is met with skepticism and other elements such as work competition and a very negative environment. One of her new co-workers remarks that she is "Capitol Hill Barbie!", an obvious criticism of Elle's fashion sense (there has even been a Barbie doll based on Elle Woods). As with the first movie, Elle and her dog are mainly dressed in pink, a color that dominates their lives. After an abortive attempt to make herself feel better by having her co-workers write compliments about one another in a "snap cup", she starts to lose her faith in the people in Washington.
As the story moves along, Elle discovers that her dog is actually homosexual. She also finds that the leading congresswoman at the House of Congress used to be a member of her Delta Nu society in school, and they become friends. The congresswoman and the senator join Elle in her quest to make animal testing unlawful. She also discovers that the congresswoman she is working for (Sally Field's character) is backstabbing her, by carrying out the orders of a character named Bob, who never actually has a physical appearance at the movie, but is a donor to the congresswoman's election fund. She is prevented from voting against Elle's proposition by a co-worker who has a recording of an incriminating phone conversation that Elle's boss had with Bob.
Eventually, Elle gets enough signatures to have the law against animal testing passed. She gets married in a park in DC, albeit not at Fenway Park as she had planned. At the end, when Emmett asks where to live, Elle says she has the perfect place, the White House.
[edit] Cast
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Reese Witherspoon | Elle Woods |
| Sally Field | Representative Victoria Rudd |
| Regina King | Grace Rossiter |
| Jennifer Coolidge | Paulette |
| Bruce McGill | Representative Stanford Marks |
| Dana Ivey | Congresswoman Libby Hauser |
| Mary Lynn Rajskub | Reena Giuliani |
| Jessica Cauffiel | Margot |
| Alanna Ubach | Serena McGuire |
| J Barton | Timothy McGinn |
| Stanley Anderson | Michael Blaine |
| Bruce Thomas | UPS Guy |
| Bob Newhart | Sid Post |
| Luke Wilson | Emmett Richmond |
| Ruth Williamson | Madeline Kroft |
[edit] Reaction
Rated #21 in Entertainment Weekly's Top 25 Worst Sequels Ever Made[1] (2006).
[edit] Box office
The movie hit theaters on the Wednesday before the Fourth of July in 2003 and grossed nearly $40 million by Monday. However, the following weekend the movie saw sales get sliced in half and LB2 quickly left theaters in the coming weeks. Grossing about $90 million in the U.S., the film was a success for the studio, though many expected it to perform just as well as Witherspoons last big movie Sweet Home Alabama. The now Sony-owned MGM decided against a Legally Blonde 3 after the sequel failed to show legs at the box office and the cost of continuing the franchise was increasing with fewer profits and the rising demand of Reese Witherspoon. In the end, Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde did not make enough money to warrant another sequel.
[edit] Trivia
- The black-and-white film Elle (Reese Witherspoon) and her fiancé Emmett (Luke Wilson) are watching is Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939).
- Jimmy Choo, the shoe designer, was asked to make 63 different pairs of shoes for the film, all out of man-made materials (to be animal-friendly along the line of the line of non-animal cruelty, the line of the film). Reese Witherspoon asked to keep them all, along with all of the designer clothing she wore in the film.
- Cameo: (David Nicksay) The producer is one of the Congressmen that Elle talks to while trying to round up signatures for the discharge petition.
- Breckin Meyer drafted some of the rewrites of the script.
- In the beginning sequence of the scrap book, the photo of Elle Woods as a little girl is actually that of Bruiser's trainer.
- Jessica Cauffiel (Margot) and Alanna Ubach (Serena) were originally only going to be in the opening scene, but they were written into the script more, while shooting was going on.
- The scenes on the steps of the U.S. Capitol were filmed at the Utah State Capitol. The scenes from Boston were filmed in the Delta Center. The scenes inside the Capitol were actually filmed at the Illinois State Capitol Building. Both were modeled after and look similar to the national Capitol. Many Salt Lake City and Springfield locals took parts as extras in the movie.
- As Reese Witherspoon was growing out her shorter hair from filming Sweet Home Alabama (2002), all Elle's hair and hairstyles throughout the movie are top-grade wigs.
- The author of the book "Everything you always wanted to know about how to pass a bill" is shown as Tom Altobello, who is the assistant property master for the movie.
- Reese Witherspoon was pregnant during filming.
- The One Million Dog March was Reese Witherspoon's idea.
- During the opening scene, while looking at the scrapbook, one of the girls points to a photo of Elle with Congresswoman Rudd (Sally Field). She says, "Those are two kick-ass women. I like them, I really like them", a reference to Sally Field's acceptance speech at the 1985 Oscars.
- Bruiser's mother, is the same dog (Gidget) as the Taco Bell chihuahua.
[edit] External links
