Lionsgate casts Reese Witherspoon in Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus movie, like that solves everything
Suggesting that Lionsgate hasn't even been listening and just doesn't care, the studio has attached Reese Witherspoon as the lead in the long-gestating movie adaptation of best-selling relationship manual Men Are From Mars, Women Are Venus—a pat solution offered to a problem that is so like Lionsgate, always looking for the easy way out of a conversation so it can get back to playing with its Leprechaun remakes or whatever. "You want a romantic comedy about how men and women communicate differently, right? Here, Reese Witherspoon has been in like a dozen of those," Lionsgate said, just like that, totally ignoring the fact that sometimes it's good to talk about the problem of crafting some sort of unique narrative out of a self-help manual, and not just throw out the first thing that comes to mind so a studio can retreat to its little "studio cave."
"I suppose you think casting Reese Witherspoon makes me feel special, but it doesn't," John Gray's 1992 self-help book said bitterly, pointing out that just having Witherspoon hardly makes it feel any better about competing with all those other movies based on similarly narrative-free, non-fiction books, such as He's Just Not That Into You, What To Expect When You're Expecting, Think Like A Man, and even The Guinness Book Of World Records, most of which already had their own Reese Witherspoon equivalents. "But you're way prettier than the Guinness Book Of World Records," Lionsgate replied, only to be told that that was so not the point, and that they hate it when Lionsgate tries to shut them up with flattery like that.
"And by the way, why the hell is Bryan Buckley, the commercials director behind those obnoxious Siri ads and the so-called 'King Of The Super Bowl,' suddenly in charge of this thing? What does your football buddy have to do with any of this?" Lionsgate was asked pointedly. Talking slowly and, really, sort of patronizingly, Lionsgate suggested that maybe Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus should just calm down and they would see if, I don't know, Kate Hudson could also be in the movie. At which point the book threw up its arms and walked away, exclaiming that Lionsgate obviously just doesn't get it.