For someone who just threw an entitled drunk tantrum, Reese Witherspoon sure is charming. Explaining her unusual, eyes-closed mug shot, an Atlanta police source came to Witherspoon’s defense, telling People “she wasn’t being difficult or rude, but her motor skills weren’t what they needed to be.” Our own Maureen O’Connor interpreted Witherspoon’s look as “a look of embarrassed acceptance,” combining knowingness and exhaustion. We now have reason to believe it may also have included elements of physical disorientation. “She was wobbly. She didn’t need help walking, but she wasn’t at a point where we could get a really clear picture,” the source said. Indeed, the outtakes sound like the blurry photobooth strip you find in your purse after a fun night out: “On another picture, she sort of bent down at the waist and we got the top of her head.” A local criminal defense attorney told People the eyes-closed mug shot suggests the actress got some kind of special treatment. “You can’t look down in the photograph,” lawyer Peter Odom said. “The whole point of a mugshot is for identification purposes.” Unless, as Witherspoon explained to the police at the scene of the crime, everyone already knows who she is.
