[podcast flashvars=”titles: ‘obese in hollywood'”]http://www.thelivinlowcarbshow.com/shownotes/wp-content/uploads/llvlcep78-repost.mp3[/podcast]
Hello and welcome to Episode 78 of the Internet’s hottest low-carb lifestyle-based podcast, “The Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Show with Jimmy Moore!”
Today, our host Jimmy looks at the two-sided issue of the depiction of obesity in Hollywood films. While it is a good thing (from our perspective) that movies are more comfortable having overweight protagonists, there is a decidedly dark side, too.
Oftentimes, these roles go to svelte actors in “fat suits.” Then, the way these characters are depicted on screen plays right in to asinine stereotypes (fat people are jolly, goofy, effeminate…take your pick). Put those two factors together, and it’s starting to look kinda like a fatty-fatty-two-by-four minstrel show.
Listen in to today’s show to hear Jimmy’s choices for who gets it right, and who’s wide of the mark–then let us know what YOU think by leaving a comment below!
LINKS MENTIONED IN EPISODE 78
– Eddie Murphy’s Norbit
– Ryan Reynolds’ Just Friends
– Danny DeVito’s Batman Returns
– Gwyneth Paltrow’s Shallow Hal
– Eddie Murphy’s Nutty Professor
– Martin Lawrence’s Big Momma’s House
– Julia Roberts’ America’s Sweethearts
– Mo’Nique’s Phat Girlz
Did you miss something Jimmy said in Episode 78? No prob, Bob! For a full transcript, see below:
Transcript of Episode 78
This is Episode 78 of “The Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Show with Jimmy Moore.” It’s hot outside right now and we’re sizzling with another smokin’ episode talking about the subject of diet, health, and weight loss. I appreciate you making this podcast a regular part of your life and encourage you to share it with a friend or family member who could use a healthy dose of education, encouragement and inspiration.
I’d like to talk about something I’ve noticed in the past few years since I’ve lost weight and it seems to be getting more and more prevalent. We all know that losing weight is hard enough on its own, but then it gets to be embarrassing when you see how ridiculous fat people are portrayed in the movies these days. Have you seen the recent Eddie Murphy comedy film called “Norbit” yet? One of the many characters he plays is a rude, obnoxious and morbidly obese woman named Rasputia whose famous one-liner is “How YOU doin’?” It’s funny to watch Murphy play this rotund, mean-spirited beast of a lady, but why do we laugh at her? Is it simply because we know a skinny man is portraying this role inside of a fat suit or does it run deeper into our human psyche to say something about how fat people are viewed? That’s something I want you to think about during Episode 78 today.
While we are on the subject of obese people in movies, have you noticed a lot of plot lines in recent years have featured them in what I believe is a not-so-subtle move by Hollywood movie executives to reach out to an audience of people who comprise two-thirds of the United States–the overweight and obese. One of the most prominent examples of this was the release of the movie “Just Friends” in 2005, which was about an overweight guy in high school who had the hots for a cute blonde girl deciding to lose over 100 pounds and come back years later to see if she’ll have him. Hollywood obviously sees dollar signs by capitalizing on the theme of weight loss bringing about positive experiences. I will admit to you that when I saw the trailer for this movie, I couldn’t wait to see it. Ever since I lost over 180 pounds in 2004 thanks to the low-carb lifestyle, I am so compelled by stories of weight loss victory, real or fictional. There is no doubt in my mind that many moviegoers lived vicariously through the lead character in the hopes that they too can win the affection of that high school crush who wouldn’t have them because they were overweight or obese.
The premise of this movie was rather simplistic: boy is fat, is the friend of a beautiful girl, wants to be more than that, runs away in an embarrassing tizzy when his real feelings come out, loses a lot of weight, comes back to win the love of the woman he always wanted. That’s the movie plot in a nutshell. When I saw “Just Friends,” I was looking forward to the movie despite the fact that I was sure it would offer the typical fat cliches. And it did. Dorky fat person hangs out with nerd-type friends and allows the jock-types to push them around. Yadda yadda yadda. We’ve seen and heard all of this so many times before it really has gotten old (especially since most of these stereotypes are not true!). Although we’ve seen it all before, there were some intriguing twists to this movie that were sometimes strange and even surprising to me because of how out-of-place they seemed in a movie like this. Before you send me an e-mail using the “it’s only a movie” argument against me, I know, I KNOW. But I can’t help but ask some very obvious questions about the details in this movie that I think make it difficult to swallow at times, despite the fact that I enjoyed watching it. Whether you’ve seen the movie or not, think about these issues for just a moment:
1. How realistic is it that “the hottest girl in school” would hang out and be friends with “the fattest guy in school?”
This caught my attention right away at the beginning of the movie. Here is the girl that every guy in school wishes he could be with and she’s best friends with the fat guy. Say what?! When has this EVER happened? The cute blonde character played by actress Amy Smart is seen bouncing up and down on her bed excited about graduation while alone with the obese guy named Chris Bender portrayed by Ryan Reynolds who secretly has a crush on her and desperately wants to tell her how he really feels. Only in a movie would a man that size ever have the opportunity to get that close to a girl like that in high school. Maybe I’m wrong about this, but I don’t see the captain of the cheerleading squad embracing as a friend someone who is essentially an outcast by the rest of the school no matter how “sensitive” he is. She would be ribbed and ridiculed way too much by her “cool” friends to ever keep that relationship alive. Am I right? It could possibly happen, but most likely it would not.
2. Why isn’t “the hottest girl in school” married already ten years after high school?
Okay, this was also puzzling to me. Here is this beautiful girl who for all intents and purposes could choose whoever she wants to be with (although she made some poor choices in high school according to the storyline) and she isn’t married or even dating anyone? In the real world, that would be pretty far-fetched to me. Although several suitors line up in the movie in an attempt to woo her, I still find it hard to believe that at the age of 28 or so she would not have already walked the aisle and gotten married. They never really developed her character enough to find out WHY she wasn’t married yet, although at the end of the movie she says her dream over the next ten years was to get married and have kids. Guess who she ended up with? No big surprise there. 
3. Why are fat people always portrayed as so gay-sounding and looking?
While I am sure he was simply following the directions of his director, I was completely turned off by how Ryan Reynolds portrayed Chris Brander when he was in the fat suit. The slightly-slurred speech and elongated ends of words made him sound so freakin’ gay. What’s up with that? Even when I weighed 410 pounds, I was NEVER even remotely gay. Yes, it is possible for a fat man to be a manly man, believe it or not! Even worse was the fact that they made the Chris Brander character a CHEERLEADER with his best friend Jamie, aka “the hottest girl in school.” What really, really fat person, man or woman, do you EVER remember being a cheerleader in high school? Anyone? ANYONE? That’s right, THEY WEREN’T! That was so crazy to see him jumping up and down in a cheerleader outfit!
4. Is it a prerequisite that all fat people are weaklings?
While we’re on how fat people are portrayed in this movie, what’s up with being pushed around by jocks? I was bigger than most of the athletes in high school, so they really never messed with me because of my size. Sure I got teased, but I don’t think any of them would have ever just pushed me away in the middle of a conversation with someone like the Chris Brander character was. They probably couldn’t do that since I weighed so much!
5. What’s with the anger and hostility from someone with major weight loss success?
In the movie, the main character loses a whole lotta weight after high school and then seeks revenge on those who were oppressive to him. NEWSFLASH: All former fat people who have lost weight haven’t become cynical about how people treated them in the past. I admit it is has been hard to see some people treat me differently now that I am not obese anymore, but for the most part I am the same man I was nearly 200 pounds ago and feel no grudges towards anyone. We’re not all out to seek reparations against the world!
The stereotypical role of a fat person in a movie is generally used for laughs as the butt of the jokes or of the weak victim of some sort. And think about the last time you saw an overweight person playing in the lead role of ANY film that did not make an issue of their weight. Hmmmm? Need more time to think? (Tick tock tick tock tick tock) None coming to mind? (crickets) I couldn’t think of any either. Sure, we’ve had a few anomalies like Dom DeLuise in the 70s and 80s, Danny DeVito from the 80s and 90s, and Drew Carey in the 90s and now the host of the game shows “The Power of 10″ and “The Price Is Right,” but none of these men were pitted for lead roles in movies. They were always the fat sidekick used for laughs. In fact, it was DeVito’s rotund figure that made him the perfect choice to portray The Penguin in the Batman movie.
Do you remember that Jack Black/Gwyneth Paltrow movie from a few years back called “Shallow Hal?” Who did it star? An ultra-thin, beautiful blonde actress and what role did she play? A 300-pound woman. While I will again admit I LOVED this movie because of the overriding message it contained about loving people for who they are regardless of their size, it is such a shame they had to put a fat suit on Paltrow rather than use an obese actress for the part. I’m sure there were plenty of talented obese actresses who could have handled that role. This brings me to a good point to ponder: Why isn’t Hollywood using real actors and actresses to play the overweight roles in these movies? If two-thirds of the nation is either overweight or obese, then surely there is a good percentage of up-and-coming actors and actresses who are carrying around some extra pounds, too. So use ‘em already! Why do we need to hire fat suit makeup artists when the real McCoys are out there? And when you do give them a role, don’t make them these sad basket cases who have no sense of self-worth at all. Many overweight and obese people are strong people who have endured years of physical and mental torture, yet they keep on smiling and living life just like everybody else. They have a real story to tell if their voice is allowed to be heard.
Instead, Hollywood feeds us Eddie Murphy as Rasputia and “The Nutty Professor,” Martin Lawrence as a fat lady in the “Big Momma’s House” series or a fat-suited Julia Roberts in “America’s Sweetheart.” These people wouldn’t know what it’s like to be a fat person if it smacked them upside the head! That’s what makes it so insulting to those of us who have lived the life of an obese person because we KNOW they don’t understand. The negative stereotypes of fat people continue on because of the kind of characterizations in these movies by skinny actors that become such a part of our culture that people believe them whether they are true or not. There is one glaring exception to this that I’ve seen in the past few years, although that movie didn’t do very well at the box office. It starred the actress Mo’Nique in the 2006 film called “Phat Girlz.” Congratulations to Mo’Nique for landing such a major role in a film and I hope this is only the beginning for her and other overweight actors and actresses. The blatant discrimination that overweight and obese actors have had to endure for generations may be finally turning a corner as society could be becoming more and more accepting of the obese than it once was. But let’s not take away from what Mo’Nique brings to the table in talent. She is a very funny lady who has been seen on “Showtime at the Apollo,” HBO’s “Def Comedy Jam,” and most recently starring in the hit UPN series “The Parkers” where she has been showered with numerous award nominations for her excellent comedic acting skills. Her comedy is in-your-face and not for the faint of heart. But that’s just the way she likes it! “Phat Girlz” was interesting because it featured a “smart-mouthed aspiring fashion designer” who is frustrated with her weight because it has gotten in the way of her ability to find a romantic interest and general approval from the people around her. But the movie takes an interesting turn when she finally meets a man who thinks she’s sexy and beautiful just the way she is. “Phat Girlz” was a very funny movie with a great message of acceptance for the obese.
So what should we make of Hollywood trying to suck up to the obese with all these movies about them? Are they being sincere in trying to connect with an audience that has grown tired of storylines featuring grossly thin actresses falling for the hunky Hollywood leading man? There’s no telling what their motive is, but you can bet they are hoping to cash in on this genre of movie. If movies like “Shallow Hal,” “Phat Girlz,” and “Just Friends” can continue to be somewhat successful, then look for even more “fat” feature films in the future. Maybe they’ll try using REAL actors and actresses sometime though. Gee, wouldn’t that be a novel concept?!
That’s it for Episode 78 of “The Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Show with Jimmy Moore.” Do you have any comments to share about today’s podcast on fat people in the movies? Go to the show notes section at TheLivinLowCarbShow.com and tell us what you think. Thanks so much for listening today and I invite you to come back again on Monday when we bring you another exciting episode of the Internet’s #1 low-carb podcast show. So, until next time, keep on livin’ la vida low-carb!