Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston are total trailblazers in their field. The highly bankable actresses have both dominated rom-com films and star in the hit Apple TV+ series, The Morning Show, which got renewed for Season 5 ahead of the Season 4 premiere. But the two stars admitted that when thinking about the roles women play in action movies, there’s still one thing the genre gets all wrong.
If you remember back in 2015 when Reese Witherspoon presented a speech at Glamour’s Women of the Year Awards, she called out a common trope in action scripts where the woman always asks the man, “What do we do now?!” Even a viral TikTok of the speech had a fan throw in a compilation of scenes where female characters have asked that question to their male counterparts, like in Love Actually, Jumanji, Erin Brockovich and more.
Well, the Walk the Line actress looked back on that viral moment when a fan asked The Morning Show cast on Glamour the one thing that keeps failing when writing female characters. The Oscar winner got more thorough about why a line like that is belittling towards women:
Have you ever been in a car accident or there’s a house-like situation where there’s flooding or whatever and then you turn to a guy and you’re like ‘What do we do?’
It’s absolutely true that women are more than capable of handling a survival situation. Not only do women play the important roles of wife and mother, but they also efficiently become breadwinners of their families and even run their own businesses.
Reese Witherspoon knows a thing or two about that, as she has her own production company, Hello Sunshine, that places emphasis on female stories in TV and movies. Therefore, women are completely confident enough to come up with a survival plan on their own.
The Wild actress’ female Morning Show co-stars couldn’t have been more in agreement with a woman knowing what to do. Jennifer Aniston made sure to answer exactly what a man would say to a woman in a survival situation:
He’s turning to you and going ‘What do we do?’
Exactly! This outdated trope probably came around due to men traditionally being the leading figures of action movies while women played supporting roles. Fortunately, there’s been some progress in action movies like Gravity and The Hunger Games franchise, where the women are expected to take charge while the men support. But there’s always room for improvement in a female character headlining an action flick. You can watch The Morning Show cast on Glamour in full below:
The Morning Show may not be an action movie, but it’s an Apple TV+ dramedy that centers on the women of broadcasting. We see how female characters respond to issues real-life women face in the workplace, like sexual harassment, ageism and gender bias in a male-dominated field. But through female inclusion with showrunners Kerry Ehrin and Charlotte Stoudt shaping the storytelling and production companies like Hello Sunshine behind it, the series highlights women’s voices onscreen and off.
Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston agree that men have a better chance of turning to women for help than the other way around. Through the actresses' streaming series, their characters continue to prove that a woman’s intuition, strength, and leadership are important tools to use in a moment of crisis. You can find new episodes of The Morning Show Season 4 available every Wednesday with your Apple TV+ subscription.
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