Reese Witherspoon Clears Up Rumors About Her “Very Dear Friend” Kate Winslet: “Don’t Believe the Internet”

Reese Witherspoon would like to correct a rumor that she inadvertently started. While promoting her romantic comedy You’re Cordially Invited, the Oscar winner shared a cheeky anecdote about her falling-out with another A-list actress—someone who, Witherspoon said, “no longer talks to me.” Fans deduced that the former friend could be Kate Winslet. But according to People, the Big Little Lies star subsequently took to her Instagram story to debunk the rumor, where she wrote that the two are “good friends” and “have never had any falling-out.”

“Hey guys. Just spoke to my very dear friend for years, Kate W. We laughed about this stupidity,” Witherspoon wrote in a now expired Instagram story. “Please do not believe the internet.”

Given the details Witherspoon included in her initial anecdote, you couldn’t blame the public for thinking that she was alluding to Winslet in the first place. In conversation with her costar Will Ferrell for People, Witherspoon shared an embarrassing story about a relatively new friend of hers whom Witherspoon described as “a very serious, proper actress.”

“She asked me to give her an award, but I had never been to this award ceremony, so I thought it was like a roast,” Witherspoon said. “So I got up and I roasted her.”

Apparently, the tone of the event was “British, elegant, [and] classy,” while Witherspoon’s comedic stylings leaned more bawdy and included a specific reference to her and her friend getting laser hair removal together. “I’m still embarrassed about it,” Witherspoon told Ferrell. “[We’re] not friends anymore. I’m not even kidding—we’re not friends anymore! I think she doesn’t like me anymore. I thought it was so funny, and it was just…I had the wrong audience. It was pretty bad. Not even kidding, she doesn’t talk to me anymore. Oh well.”

It just so happens that in 2007, Witherspoon presented Winslet with an award at the BAFTA/LA Cunard Britannia Awards. According to an alleged partial transcript of her speech from that evening found on a Witherspoon fan site and first republished on Just Jared, Witherspoon lovingly roasted Winslet that evening. “I always wanted to be a European movie star, wear giant sunglasses, elaborate neck scarves, smoke hand-rolled cigarettes, and have savoir faire and gravitas,” said Witherspoon, per Just Jared. “Imagine my good fortune when Kate Winslet moved into my neighborhood, rang my doorbell, and said, [in a British accent] ‘Dahling, Sam [Mendes, Winslet’s husband at the time] is off shooting, and I believe our children are the same age. Could they possibly have a playdate, and oh, by the way, it’s almost nine o’clock and I’ve had nothing to do drink. Do you have any wine?’”

The original post on the Witherspoon fan site also references stories that Witherspoon reportedly mentioned but deemed “too embarrassing” to share in full at the ceremony, like a time she and Winslet allegedly got laser hair removal together.

Although it would be easy to believe that Just Jared may have found the smoking gun in the case of which A-list actress iced-out Tracy Flick, Witherspoon wants us not to believe the hype. “This is completely UNTRUE …so silly!” she wrote in a separate slide on her Instagram story. For what it’s worth, Winslet and Witherspoon presented at the 2016 Oscars together and were photographed being chummy backstage. So, as Elle Woods would say, case closed.