Reese Witherspoon believes that the decline of romantic comedies has made dating harder for a new generation.
The Legally Blonde actress, 49, made the claim in a recent appearance on Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert podcast.
“There’s been this decline in rom-coms or big movie stars doing rom-coms over the last 10 or 15 years,” she said. “But that’s where we learned social dynamics.”
Witherspoon explained that romantic comedies and coming-of-age shows used to teach young people how to approach relationships. “The show you watched when you were 11, 12 or 13 made you imagine dating skills,” she said, mentioning Young Sheldon, The Goldbergs, and Everybody Hates Chris as examples.
Shepard, 50, agreed, saying boys especially benefit from seeing examples of vulnerability on screen. “Someone needs to tell you everyone’s equally afraid of it, and you just gotta do it,” he said.
Witherspoon, who has starred in several rom-coms herself, including Sweet Home Alabama and Your Place or Mine, added, “We started saying rom-coms are cringey, but that’s actually where we learned how to relate from Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.”
The actress shares three children, including Ava, 26, and Deacon, 21, with ex-husband Ryan Phillippe, and Tennessee, 13, with ex-husband Jim Toth and is currently dating German financier Oliver Haarmann.