Reese Witherspoon Reportedly Considering Major Business Move

Reese Witherspoon's Hello Sunshine production company is reportedly looking for a buyer. The production company is behind such recent television hits as HBO's Big Little Lies and Apple TV+'s The Morning Show, both starring Witherspoon. The Oscar-winner founded Hello Sunshine in 2016 with Strand Equity co-founder and managing partner Seth Rodsky. Its Pacific Standard subsidiary also produced the films Wild and Gone Girl.

The pricetag for Hello Sunshine is expected to hit $1 billion, according to Variety, as streamers become increasingly desperate to add more original content to their platforms. This drive is partly why Amazon bought MGM for $8.45 billion recently and WarnerMedia merged with Discovery. Sources told The Wall Street Journal last week that Apple was one of the companies interested in Hello Sunshine. The company hired financial advisers, but it is not clear how far along their process in finding a buyer is.

Witherspoon launched her first production company, Type A Films, back in 2000. In 2012, she merged the company with another production company to create Pacific Standard in 2012. After Witherspoon's producing partner left in 2016, she took complete control of Pacific Standard. That same year, she launched Hello Sunshine to produce more female-driven stories for film and television. Pacific Standard then became a Hello Sunshine subsidiary.

Although Hello Sunshine is a young player in Hollywood, Witherspoon has already proven to have a knack at finding good material. Big Little Lies proved to be a big hit for HBO, even inspiring a second season with the characters inspired by Liane Moriarty's novel. The Morning Show has become Apple TV+'s buzziest show, as it stars Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston. Hello Sunshine is also behind the Hulu limited series Little Fires Everywhere and the upcoming Amazon series Daisy Jones & The Six starring Riley Keough. The company has also produced Facebook Watch shows and a podcast network. Witherspoon also launched a Hello Sunshine book club.

During a May 2020 interview with CBS Sunday Morning, Witherspoon said her inspiration for Hello Sunshine came when her husband, agent Jim Toth, asked her if she would try to make some of the books she loves into movies. "To me always, authors were my rock stars growing up," Witherspoon said last year. "So being able to … this is gonna make me emotional, but like, sometimes when our writers say, like, 'You changed my life financially,' or that, oh my God, we're like putting them in a position where they get read and seen when they deserve it so much, is worth everything."