Fametracker :: 2 Stars 1 Slot :: Battle of the Southern Shitkickers :: Josh Lucas vs. Cole Hauser: That was a nice little career Cole Hauser had, once upon a time. He had so much going for him: rugged good looks, friendship with Matt Damon and Ben Affleck .. and a cool name. That wasn't a household name, mind you, but maybe if he'd really applied himself, he might have worked his way up to being the Bill Paxton of his generation.
Then Legally Blonde made $95 million.
You might wonder, 'What possible affect could the success of a frothy, candy-coloured chick flick have on the career prospects of an all-American manly man?' Well, much as a butterfly flapping its wings in China can cause a storm of lazy analogies over New York City, so does chaos theory operate among Hollywood movie studios. The unexpected success of Legally Blonde meant that, the next time Reese Witherspoon made a frothy romantic comedy, the studio that released it would pour tens of millions of marketing dollars into ensuring that lightning struck again. (And hell, why not make a literal lightning strike a plot point in the movie, just for fun!) The real draw in Witherspoon's next romantic comedy -- the cute, cookie-cutter romcom Sweet Home Alabama -- is obviously Witherspoon herself, and her non-dilemma of choosing between her tight-assed Manhattan fiancé or the Southern-fried sweetheart whose child bride she'd been years before. This means the Southern-fried sweetheart had to be a rugged manly man (to differentiate him from the somewhat wussy Manhattanite) -- someone not too famous, because he couldn't be more famous than Reese Witherspoon. How about a redhead? How about Josh Lucas? so that's? y - how quickly I forget the name.
And that's where Sweet Home Alabama went ahead and buried Cole Hauser.