Reese Witherspoon clears up misconception about Sweet Home Alabama

Reese Witherspoon has cleared up a common misconception about the 2002 romantic-comedy, Sweet Home Alabama.

The actor plays Melanie Carmichael as she navigates romance and reconciles her country identity with her new life in the big city. The movie takes its title from the Lynyrd Skynyrd song of the same name.

Witherspoon’s character gets engaged to New York’s most eligible bachelor, Andrew Hennings (played by Grey’s Anatomy star Patrick Dempsey), while her childhood sweetheart and husband Jake Perry (played by American Psycho actor Josh Lucas) refuses to divorce her.

The Legally Blonde star, however, says people often confuse her love interest with Interstellar actor Matthew McConaughey.

“All I want to say about Sweet Home Alabama is that is not Matthew McConaughey,” Witherspoon told People. “I know a lot of people think it’s Matthew. “

McConaughey is often confused for Lucas, according to Witherspoon.

“Matthew always says, ‘Everybody comes up to me and says, ‘Are you in Sweet Home?’ And I’m not.’ And I’m like, well, I know.”

Witherspoon has collaborated with McConaughey on other movies including Sing, Sing 2 and Mud.

“I’ve done three movies with Matthew, but he’s not in Sweet Home Alabama,” she said.

Last week, Lucas recounted a fan interaction in which he was confused with McConaughey.

He told People: “The weirdest story I have is, I once almost got into a fight with a guy because I refused to sign his autograph because he was basically telling me, ‘Hey, Matthew McConaughey, I need you to sign this autograph. I was like, ‘I’m not Matthew McConaughey.’”

The fan, however, refused to believe Lucas, telling the Ford v Ferrari actor: “You’re an a**hole, McConaughey.”

While McConaughey did not star in Sweet Home Alabama, he did appear in several other romantic-comedies in the early 2000s, including How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days and Fool’s Gold alongside Kate Hudson, The Wedding Planner with Jennifer Lopez, and Failure to Launch with Sarah Jessica Parker.

McConaughey went on to win the Oscar for Best Actor for his role in Dallas Buyer’s Club (2013) and said in his book Greenlights, that he had made a conscious decision to step away from romantic-comedies.