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Transcript

Political Junkie Summer Film Festival: Reese Witherspoon’s “Legally Blonde” (2001) with Natalia Mehlman Petrzela

A recording from Claire Potter's live video

Thank you to everyone who tuned into today’s live video! This morning, Natalia and I had fun talking about Elle Woods (Reese Witherspoon) making the transition from SoCal sorority president to class valedictorian at Harvard Law School!

If you have not yet watched “Legally Blonde,” go here.

Stay tuned for the next film in my series about the cultural obsession with Harvard University. Historian Neil J. Young will join us for a Substack Live about that classic Harvard romance, “Love Story” (1970), adapted from the 1970 best-selling novel of the same name by classics professor Erich Segal. A faculty member at Harvard, Yale and Princeton universities, Segal is rumored to have based the lead male character Oliver Barrett IV (O’Neal) on two Crimson athletes: future Vice President Al Gore and his roommate, future actor Tommy Lee Jones.

The film stars Ryan O’Neal and Ali McGraw in breakout performances as cross-class undergraduate lovers.

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