Hello Sunshine hosted its third annual Shine Away summit over the weekend, bringing 2,000 women to the Universal Studios lot for two days of conversations spanning Hollywood, books, finances, health and lifestyle, with Reese Witherspoon at the helm.
On top of debuting her first novel Gone Before Goodbye (alongside co-writer Harlan Coben) at the event, Witherspoon also sat down for a conversation with friends Mariska Hargitay and Karen Pittman — as well as weighed in on the next generation of actresses frequently following in her footsteps in producing and developing their own projects.
“I think that’s amazing, the fact that it’s made possible, but my career is made possible by women like Lucile Ball and Jane Fonda and women who started their companies; Goldie Hawn was somebody who took control of her career and produced a lot of her films,” she told The Hollywood Reporter. “So I’m really stepping in a path that’s been carved by some pretty great women.”
She also added that younger stars frequently reach out to her when creating their own paths, and “we’ll talk about how to structure companies, how to hire people — anything women want to talk about, I’m here for mentorship because I had great mentors myself.”
On stage, Witherspoon spoke about how her Oscar-winning role in Walk the Line indirectly led her to begin her company focused on female stories, noting how breaking June Carter “out of the shadows and into the light was such a powerful moment for me. And realizing that sometimes that you can take the shininess of Hollywood or fame or whatever that means — it’s so confusing when you’re young too — and shine it on more deserving people, or what I perceive as women who deserve the spotlight.”
“When I think about Walk the Line, I think about it as a seed of Hello Sunshine,” she continued. “That was kind of my first experience of bringing this woman who deserves attention into the light, so that was kind of the building block for my ideology that started Hello Sunshine five years later.”
She also admitted that when she started the company, she took an investment from AT&T and “sat in a room full of men, and I was like, ‘I know what I’m doing and you’re giving me millions of dollars and it’s going to be great for you and women are going to like it.’ … And then I walked out of the room and I was like, ‘Oh my God, I don’t know what I’m doing.’ I didn’t have a CEO, I didn’t have anything. I just had an acting career and a passion for books. But I was like, ‘I will figure it out.’” AT&T chief marketing officer Kellyn Smith Kenny, who moderated the chat, then revealed that Witherspoon gave investors a 10x return on their money.
The group also spent much of the conversation discussing Hargitay’s recent documentary My Mom Jayne, an exploration of her relationship with mother Jayne Mansfield that the Law & Order: SVU star directed. Hargitay said she was “terrified” to helm the project and met with five other directors first, justifying, “They know how to do it. They’re more objective. I could never tell this story. This is too complex” before deciding to take the chance and do it herself.
“People, they project on me, they think that I’m Olivia Benson and I’m badass and I’m fearless,” she said of her SVU character. “I’m like, Oh, I’m not fearless. I’m super scared — but the motto that I have is ‘feel the fear and do it anyway.’ And I learned that from Olivia Benson.”
Pittman also explained of her career, after recent breakout roles in The Morning Show and And Just Like That, “There’s a unique experience, I think, that you have as an African American actress, where people do see you and you represent something to them, something bigger and greater. It’s a teeny burden, not huge burden, but I know that I represent something to women of color when they see me as Mia Jordan (in The Morning Show) or Dawn Edwards (in Forever) or Nya Wallace (in And Just Like That). So that’s also inspiration for me to keep going, and that’s needed.”
The third annual Shine Away event, which this year took over the Universal Studios lot, featured additional conversations with Chrissy Teigen, Malin Akerman, Lilly Singh, Monica Lewinsky, Ellie Kemper, Angela Kinsey, Molly Sims and Brittany Snow, along with an opening comedy set from Yvonne Orji.
