Everything we know so far about Legally Blonde 3

Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) is making her big screen return ... eventually.

In June of 2018, EW confirmed that a third Legally Blonde film was in the works with writers Karen McCullah and Kirsten "Kiwi" Smith, who wrote the original 2001 film about Elle, a pink-obsessed sorority girl so determined to marry her preppy boyfriend, Warner (Matthew Davis), that she followed him to Harvard Law School, only to realize that she was way, way too good for him. But since its announcement, the third film has undergone a handful of changes and is still yet to start filming.

Legally Blonde 3 would mark the first Witherspoon-led film in the franchise since 2003's Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde. (Legally Blondes was released in 2009 but did not star Witherspoon.)

Here, we break down what we do know so far about the movie.

Everett Collection Reese Witherspoon in 'Legally Blonde'

Writers

Although it was originally reported that McCullah and Smith, the writers of the original 2001 film — but not the 2003 sequel — would handle the script, that changed in May of 2020 when Never Have I Ever's Mindy Kaling and Brooklyn Nine-Nine's Dan Goor were announced as screenwriters.

Kaling took to social media following the news, saying, "Finally some use for my Elle Woods fan fiction! So excited to be reunited with my friends [Reese Witherspoon, Lauren Neustadter] and Dan Goor to work on this movie. Elle Woods is so iconic, proving you can be girly and smart at the same time. Bend and snap people!"

Cast

Witherspoon is on board to star and produce the film, but no other official cast announcements have been made. That being said, back in July of 2018, Regina King, who played Grace in Legally Blonde 2, and Matthew Davis, who played Warner in Legally Blonde, both shared interest in returning.

"I would love to see where the writers think Warner is at this point," Davis said. "I would love to see something where perhaps Warner is married to a politician, to a woman who's running for office, and he's sort of like a kept man. And her opponent is another candidate, and the person running the campaign is Elle Woods. So it's Elle Woods driving this campaign against the wife of Warner."

As for King, she responded to the movie news saying, "I freakin' love Reese and if she asked me to come back, even if it was just for a scene, I would."

Luke Wilson and Selma Blair have also shown interest in being part of the film, and in February of 2023, Witherspoon told Entertainment Tonight, "There is no Legally Blonde 3 without Jennifer Coolidge." Following that comment, Coolidge told Extra, "Of course, I would be on board. I've been hearing about it for a long time. Maybe it really is happening at this point. I would absolutely love to do Legally Blonde 3."

Release date

Here's the real question: After years of talk, when will we get to see Legally Blonde 3? Originally, it was scheduled to hit theaters on Valentine's Day of 2020.

Then, with all of the chaos of 2020, the film was pushed until May of 2022.

But we still don't have a date.

In March of 2022, Kaling told Time that the film was delayed indefinitely while she and Goor worked on the script. "We don't want to be responsible for ruining what's basically Reese's Avengers franchise," Kaling said, teasing that the film will explore questions like: "What is Elle Woods like at 42? Does she end up becoming all the things she wanted? How does that personality manifest in a grown woman? Has she become more cynical? Her brightness and her cheerfulness really worked when she was 22, but how has life changed her perspective on things?"

A couple of months later, in August of 2022, Witherspoon compared the film to Top Gun: Maverick, telling USA Today, "I'm still hoping that Legally Blonde 3 is gonna come together in the right way. It's just like Top Gun: They waited a long time to make another version of that movie, and I loved the nostalgia piece they incorporated in it. So definitely that gave us a lot of inspiration about what we would want to do with Elle Woods and make sure that we had all those same touchstones that mattered to people (back) then. I feel like these characters are my friends, so I safeguard them. I would never make the subpar, mediocre version of their story."

One thing's for sure: Whoever said movies were easy to make was seriously disturbed.

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