Reese Witherspoon went completely makeup free for Wild

Reese Witherspoon thought Wild (Dec. 5) director Jean-Marc Vallee would give a little leeway in his request that she go makeup-free to portray Cheryl Strayed in the film adaptation of her bestselling memoir, but his request was staunch.

“Yeah, yeah, a little mascara and a little cover-up, right? No, no makeup,” Witherspoon recalled at the Toronto Film Festival. She was startled when she saw the first footage of herself on screen without a bit of makeup. “It was raw. I’d never seen myself in a movie like that before,” she says.

That wasn’t the only thing that was authentic, the massive pack she wore wasn’t stuffed with newspaper or filler, it really was full of the brim of camping equipment. “It changed the way I walked. It dug into my shoulders and I saw how quickly I got tired,” Witherspoon she says of the experience.

Wild is out Dec. 5.