SPOILER ALERT: This story incorporates key plot particulars, together with the ending, from “Elle,” now streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Whereas most showrunners spend the times main as much as their sequence’ debut questioning whether or not audiences will hear and whether or not they’ll finally be renewed, “Elle” bosses Laura Kittrell and Caroline Dries had a unique downside: navigating the press with out spoiling Season 2 that is already filmed.
In January, Amazon renewed the prequel sequence “Legally Blonde,” which follows Elle Woods in highschool, that transformative time earlier than the plucky pupil utilized to Harvard Regulation College and solved her first case by harnessing the basics of sustaining perms. And the studio’s confidence was rewarded: Amazon stories that “Elle” was the most-watched present on Prime Video throughout its first week of launch.
“It’s been fairly a time,” mentioned Kittrell, who created the sequence, becoming a member of Dries on Zoom on the eve of “Elle’s” July 1 debut. “Amazon wouldn’t have it every other method,” Dries joked.
“We’re very fortunate,” Kittrell added. “The 2 weeks main as much as the premiere, all of our actors have been freaking out, like, ‘Can we watch Season 1 once more? Now we have no reminiscence of what is new, what’s outdated, what’s a spoiler, what’s not.'”
Certainly, there are many twists and turns in Season 1. The Prime Video present takes audiences again to 1995, when Elle’s (newcomer Lexi Minetree) world is turned the wrong way up as her household unexpectedly strikes from Bel-Air to Seattle after her plastic surgeon father, Wyatt (Tom Everett Scott) botches a process. Very similar to her early days at Harvard, the vivacious, pink-clad Elle struggles to slot in – this time, with the grunge-obsessed youngsters of the Pacific Northwest. The primary season’s eight episodes — titled with quotes from the 2001 movie starring Reese Witherspoon, equivalent to “Whoever Stated Orange is the New Pink Was Severely Troubled” — comply with Elle navigating her new friendships and crushes, whereas uncovering a conspiracy about embezzlement of faculty funds.
That is the place James Van Der Beek is available in.
The late TV star, whose identify is synonymous with the millennial teen drama “Dawson’s Creek,” joined “Elle” to play college principal and mayoral candidate Dean Wilson. Elle’s mom, Eva (June Diane Raphael) – whose life can also be thrown into chaos by this determination – finds objective in serving to Wilson’s marketing campaign, however it all proves for naught when Elle reveals that he was the ringleader of the whole scheme.
“We have been so flattered that he needed to do that present to start with,” Dries mentioned of Van Der Beek. “Laura and I are actually large followers of his, so working with somebody who was a hero once I was a child was a deal with. And seeing him take a personality and elevate it was so thrilling as a author.”
“Elle” government producer Jason Moore had labored with the actor on 4 episodes of “Dawson’s Creek.” “When his identify was on the audition, it was nice. Since he seems to be a nasty man, I believed, ‘What a deal with for him,'” Moore mentioned lately. Selection.
And the gig finally gave Van Der Beek, who was present process remedy for stage 3 colorectal most cancers throughout filming, as a lot as he contributed to the group behind the sequence. “It’s undoubtedly a second the place I don’t really feel my ache,” Moore mentioned of Van Der Beek’s efficiency. “Specializing in my work, I actually get utterly distracted, not solely when the digital camera is rolling, however simply once I’m with all these folks. When he obtained sick, he actually needed to hug folks and convey them collectively. He was at all times superb at that.”
The function was to be the actor’s remaining efficiency. Van Der Beek died on February 11, 2026, on the age of 48. His work within the sequence was commemorated with a particular dedication.
Learn on as Kittrell and Dries clarify extra in regards to the making of “Elle” Season 1 — from how Lexi Minetree channeled Witherspoon’s Elle Woods, to the present’s ’90s musical homages and episode “Breakfast Membership,” and the way Van Der Beek rewrote her character’s ending.
Lexi is an unimaginable discover. It is virtually uncanny how a lot of Elle’s mannerisms she has – she virtually turns into Reese Witherspoon at instances. When did you suppose, “Oh, wow! This individual is the reincarnation of Elle Woods.”
LAURA KITTRELL: It was the primary day. There are she-isms that we gave her which are intentional. Like, “Are you able to say this factor from the film?” » and she or he nails them. That was one of many issues that burdened me out probably the most earlier than doing the present: “Oh my God, how are we going to seek out this individual?” And that is one of many greatest questions folks ask earlier than watching: “Is she going to have the ability to do it?” “It is wonderful now that persons are beginning to see it. I really feel like after 30 seconds persons are like, “Oh, she obtained it, it is all good,” after which we do not care anymore. That is the expertise we had from the primary day on set. It was identical to, “Oh yeah, it is all good, we do not have to fret about that half. Nice!”