Lili Reinhart closed out the press tour for "The Love Hypothesis" the same way she started it: dressed as a piece of rom-com history. At the film's Los Angeles premiere on September 22 at the Culver Theater in Culver City, the actress wore a custom Miu Miu pink panné velvet mini slip dress recreating a look worn by Elisabeth Harnois' character, Hallie Richmond, in the 1998 Disney Channel movie "My Date with the President's Daughter."
The dress featured a scoop neckline, thin spaghetti straps and a short, fitted silhouette, rendered in a bubblegum-pink velvet with a subtle sheen. Speaking on the red carpet with E! News, Reinhart revealed the dress was the starting point for her entire promotional wardrobe strategy. "This was sort of the dress that sparked the idea of doing an homage," she said, explaining that the 1998 film has stuck with her for years and that Miu Miu agreed to build her a custom version she could keep.
Lili Reinhart channels "My Date With the President's Daughter" at the LA premiere of #TheLoveHypothesis tonight! ✨ (September 22, 2026) pic.twitter.com/etDEX2vqX0
— Lili Reinhart Online (@FRLiliReinhart) September 23, 2026
That single dress became the blueprint for weeks of themed dressing across the film's global press tour. At the film's New York premiere on September 16, held at The Forum at Columbia University, Reinhart wore a pink gown with leaf-like green embroidery pulled from Elie Saab's spring 2004 couture collection, a nod to the fairy-tale silhouettes popular in early-2000s romantic comedies. In London, she stepped out in a purple and blue 2001 Emanuel Ungaro spaghetti-strap maxi dress detailed with pearl embellishments. Her stylist, Ib Abdel Nasser, told Elle ahead of the tour that Reinhart would be paying tribute to leading ladies of the genre's "Golden Age," with looks referencing films including "13 Going on 30" and "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days."
Lili Reinhart takes method dressing to a whole new level for 'The Love Hypothesis' press tour. pic.twitter.com/3sn64tVCn2
— Buzzing Pop (@BuzzingPop) September 21, 2026
The approach places Reinhart alongside stars like Zendaya and Margot Robbie, who have popularized method dressing, tying red carpet looks directly to a film's plot or character, in recent press cycles. Reinhart's version is a step removed from that formula: rather than dressing as her own character, Olive, from "The Love Hypothesis," she built a rotating tribute to the rom-com genre itself, pulling references from movies she watched growing up rather than from the film she was promoting.
The Culver Theater premiere marked the tour's final stop before "The Love Hypothesis," based on Ali Hazelwood's bestselling novel, began streaming on Prime Video on September 23. Reinhart stars opposite Tom Bateman, with Nicholas Duvernay, Rachel Marsh and Jaboukie Young-White also joining her on the carpet. The film follows a Ph.D. candidate who enters a fake relationship with an intimidating professor after an impulsive kiss spirals out of control.
For Reinhart, the pink Miu Miu dress functions as both closing statement and origin story. It is the look she has said inspired the entire homage concept, and by bringing it back for the tour's last red carpet, she turned a monthslong press run into a cohesive, fashion-driven love letter to the genre she grew up watching. The dress's specificity, down to matching Harnois' 1998 silhouette rather than loosely referencing the era, is what has separated Reinhart's press tour from a more generic nostalgia trend, giving fashion and film audiences alike a detail to trace back to its exact source.
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