The 41-year-old actress also talks about how she's grateful that she's been able to stay connected with Matthew Lillard, another co-star of hers in the classic 1999 movie.
- Aug 30, 2021
AceShowbiz - Rachael Leigh Cook reflected on the death of her "She's All That" co-star Paul Walker back in 2013. In a new interview, the 41-year-old revealed how she reacted when she learned about the actor's passing.
"I remember how hard it hit me when I heard about Paul's passing, because you always think that there's going to be -- this is the corniest thing I've ever said," so the actress told Vanity Fair. "But you always think that there's going to be time to reminisce with people about a time that was."
In the classic 1999 movie, the "Fast & Furious" actor played Dean Sampson, the best friend of Freddie Prinze Jr.'s character, Zack Siler. Rachael, meanwhile, portrayed outcast Laney Boggs who was picked by Dean when he challenged Siler to a bet about making her a prom queen in six weeks.
Elsewhere in the interview, Rachael talked about how she's grateful that she's been able to stay connected with Matthew Lillard, another co-star of hers in the movie. "[He] was way more famous than I was at that point," she said of Matthew, who played self-obsessed reality star Brock Hudson in the flick. "We were all lightly surprised that he took the role."
Both Rachael and Matthew are among the cast for "She's All That" remake "He's All That" which stars Addison Rae. Before taking the role as Addison's mom in the Netflix movie, Rachael revealed that she had her "share of reservations" because the original "ended up being a way bigger touchstone in my life and career than I ever thought it was going to be."
"I wasn't sure how I felt about wanting to be involved because it might seem like, am I trying to play the hits again well after the fact? Am I trying to set myself up in a position of being actively compared to my younger self? That seems like a terrible idea," she explained.
She added, "It's still the main thing that when people walk up to me in the frozen food section and want to say hello, they usually want to talk about 'She's All That'. So in that sense it’s very special to me and it is kind of sacred. But ultimately I decided that rather than being asked how I felt about 'He's All That' for, plainly, the rest of my career, I would rather just be visibly supportive and forward-facing about my endorsement of the movie, as it were."
