It’s a happy 32nd birthday to Reese Witherspoon, owner of the most adorable drop-down chin in Hollywood. It’s always interesting to see how young actors and actresses manage the ups and downs of their perilous career track, because not all of them can achieve, or sustain, stratospheric-level success. Witherspoon’s attention-to-detail focus and drive is certainly well chronicled, but there’s another side to her too, though it’s probably been at least somewhat paved over by the necessary caution that becoming a box office superstar breeds. Interviewing her for both Pleasantville and Election, she talked openly about how she had seriously considered giving up acting altogether until 1996’s Freeway came along, costarring Kiefer Sutherland. (Not such a good experience, I guess, 1994’s S.F.W.) And it wasn’t bunk, or spin. It was just the honest sharings of someone who figured, “You know what, I can probably do other things in my life and be just as happy.” I’ll always have a bit of a soft spot for Witherspoon, because she’s not the most obvious or innately gifted actress out there, but she puts in hard time and hard effort, and I can identify with and appreciate that. Her focus and work ethic have helped augment and hone her talent. Plus she has low-key charm and spunk in equal measure, no small feat.