With the planned sale of Hello Sunshine, the studio she started in 2016, the Oscar winner joins the ranks of Hollywood’s power brokers.
Reese Witherspoon, the Oscar-winning actor who became a force in Hollywood as a producer and entrepreneur, reached an agreement on Monday to sell her entertainment studio, Hello Sunshine, to a newly created company backed by the investment firm Blackstone Group. Terms of the sale were not disclosed. Three people with knowledge of the agreement, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe the negotiations, said the deal valued Hello Sunshine at roughly $900 million. Ms. Witherspoon started Hello Sunshine in 2016 with the idea of creating movies and shows centered on women. The company gained momentum on the strength of two of its Emmy-winning series, “The Morning Show” for AppleTV+ and “Big Little Lies” for HBO. With the nearly $1 billion agreement, Ms. Witherspoon is moving beyond the roles that made her famous — in films like “Legally Blonde,” “Wild,” “Walk the Line” and “Election” — and into the ranks of Hollywood’s power brokers. Ms. Witherspoon and Hello Sunshine’s chief executive, Sarah Harden, will sit on the board of the Blackstone-backed company, which will be led by two former high-level Walt Disney Company executives, Kevin Mayer and Tom Staggs.
