Reese Witherspoon prodco Hello Sunshine sold for $900m to Disney duo’s start-up

Reese Witherspoon’s prodco Hello Sunshine has been sold for a reported US$900m to a new media company led by former Disney executives Tom Staggs and Kevin Mayer.

Reese Witherspoon (photo: dtstuff9 via CC)

The Legally Blonde actor and CEO Sarah Harden will continue to run the LA-based firm, joining the board of the as-yet-unnamed media company, which has been backed by private-equity giant Blackstone Group.

Founded five years ago, Hello Sunshine’s investors and partners include Witherspoon’s husband and former CAA agent Jim Toth, Seth Rodsky, Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective and AT&T.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Blackstone will spend more than $500m to purchase shares from these existing investors, while Witherspoon and other investors will put the remaining equity in Staggs and Mayer’s new company.

Hello Sunshine, which focuses on female-led content, is behind series including HBO’s thriller Big Little Lies, Apple’s The Morning Show and Hulu’s Little Fires Everywhere.

Its unscripted slate includes home organisation series The Home Edit with Clea Shearer and Joanna Teplin for Netflix and upcoming competition series My Kind of Country for Apple TV+.

On the film side, Hello Sunshine is producing an adaptation of novel Where the Crawdads Sing starring Normal People actor Daisy Edgar-Jones, as well as Aline Brosh McKenna’s feature directorial debut Your Place or Mine for Netflix.

Hello Sunshine is also home to Reese’s Book Club, which has 2.1 million followers, with many of its best-selling picks developed and produced for screen by Witherspoon’s firm. Among them is the upcoming miniseries adaptation of Daisy Jones and the Six, starring Riley Keough and Sam Claflin, for Amazon.

Witherspoon said: “Today marks a tremendous moment for Hello Sunshine. I started this company to change the way all women are seen in media. Over the past few years, we have watched our mission thrive through books, TV, film and social platforms. Today, we’re taking a huge step forward by partnering with Blackstone, which will enable us to tell even more entertaining, impactful and illuminating stories about women’s lives globally. I couldn’t be more excited about what this means for our future.”