21 Times Hollywood Fired, Rejected, Or Pressured Celebrities To Change Because Of Their Weight, And The Celebs Called Them Out
Hollywood is an infamously difficult place for anyone who doesn't fit its narrow beauty standards. Even though all bodies are beautiful, a lot of celebrities have faced unfair treatment because of their size.
Fox / Via giphy.com
However, many of them have decided to speak out against the pressure they've faced to lose weight or the rejection they've faced when they refused.
NBC / Via giphy.com
Here are 21 celebrities who were fired, rejected, or pressured to change because of their size:
Some entries include topics of eating disorders.
1.Before The Office, a network offered Mindy Kaling a sketch comedy show based on her own life but made her audition for the part of herself, then they rejected her from the role because she wasn't "considered attractive or funny enough."
She told the Guardian, "That network is no longer on the air, and The Office went on to be one of NBC's most hit shows in years. I feel like karmically, I was vindicated, but at the time it felt terrible."
2.At the end of his audition for the Blob in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, David Harbour pulled up his shirt to show his stomach and joked, "I got your Blob right here," and he was rejected from the role because they were "just a little worried about [his] health.”
He told the Wrap, “I was like, ‘Wait a minute, dude, pause for one second. You are telling me I’m "too fat" to play the Blob? That’s awesome, I have to get the fuck back to New York.’ That’s my audition — so I didn’t get the Blob.”
3.In 2004, both director Terry Gilliam and the actors in The Brothers Grimm wanted Samantha Morton to play the lead role, but Miramax, the studio behind the film, rejected her because of her weight.
She told the Sun, "I think I'm a healthy size, I'm an 8–10. I'm not going to go down the road of having my teeth done, my boobs done."
4.In 2015, Alex Newell was called in to audition for the role of Lola in Kinky Boots on Broadway, but the director said that their weight would "inhibit [them] from playing the role."
They told StyleCaster, "I was like, ‘This is a show where they’re encouraging you to be who you want to be. Don’t let them tell you who you should be.’ They literally looked me in the face and told me I was too big to play a role. There’s no limitation. My weight does not prescribe what I cannot do.”
5.Amanda Seyfried tweeted that she "almost lost out on several roles in [her] career because [she] was overweight."
A few years earlier, she said, "I have to stay in shape because I'm an actress. It's fucked up and it's twisted, but I wouldn't get the roles otherwise. If I'd been a bit bigger, I don't think they would have cast me for Mamma Mia!"
6.Early in her acting career, Jennifer Lawrence was told she needed to "lose a certain amount of weight" or she would be fired, so after she became famous, she said that "it should be illegal to call somebody fat on TV."
In an interview with Barbara Walters, she said, "I think the media needs to take responsibility for the effect it has on our younger generation. ... If we’re regulating cigarettes and sex and cuss words, because of the effect it has on our younger generation, why aren’t we regulating things like calling people fat?”
7.ABC told Margaret Cho that she was "too overweight to play the part of [herself]" in her semi-autobiographical sitcom All-American Girl, and she "ended up hospitalized with kidney failure from not eating."
Years later, she told the Cut, "Being called ugly and fat and disgusting to look at from the time I could barely understand what the words meant has scarred me so deep inside that I have learned to hunt, stalk, claim, own, and defend my own loveliness and my image of myself as stunningly gorgeous with a ruthlessness and a defensiveness that I fear for anyone who casually or jokingly questions it."
8.Margot Robbie was asked to lose weight when she was cast as Jane Porter in The Legend of Tarzan, but she refused to "look thin just for the sake of it."
She told Australia's TV Week, "It’s the 19th century [in the film] — if she’s got a bit of weight on her, it’s probably a good thing."
9.The American Ballet Theatre asked Misty Copeland to lose weight after she went through late puberty, but she refused to diet and instead focused on what made her feel good, because "you can't change your body to become something it isn't."
She told Self, "Being told to lose weight, and being African American, not having anyone else around who looked like me, caused me so much doubt."
10.Chris Pratt auditioned to play Scott Hatteberg in Moneyball, but the casting directors told him he was "too fat," which unfortunately triggered him to start crash dieting.
He told Vanity Fair, "That was the first time I heard someone say, ‘We’re not gonna cast you — you’re too fat.’ So I decided to drop the weight, like in wrestling. I couldn’t afford a trainer, so it was all running and crash-dieting and cutting alcohol.”
11.Carrie Fisher was pressured into losing 35 pounds in order to reprise her iconic role as Princess Leia in Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
She told Good Housekeeping, "Nothing changes: it’s an appearance-driven thing. I’m in a business where the only thing that matters is weight and appearance. That is so messed up. They might as well say get younger, because that’s how easy it is."
12.Monica Potter, who had recently given birth, had a great audition but was rejected from the role because of her weight, and her agent told her that they were "just going to wait a little bit" before trying to book more roles.
At the Hollywood Reporter Emmy Roundtable, she said, "The weight thing is a crappy thing to deal with in this town, you know? I’m from the town of 'eat, drink, and be merry, celebrate life.' That was a crappy audition and a crappy result. So I just went home and ate some Cheez Whiz."
13.While filming Medium, Patricia Arquette got into an argument with a producer who wanted her to lose weight for the role of Allison DuBois.
During the Hollywood Reporter TV Drama Actress Roundtable, she said, "I was like, ‘This lady is a mother, she’s married, she’s got three kids. No.’ But there’s that expectation of looking a certain way. Like, ‘OK, you could be 40, but you’ve got to be a 40 who looks 30.'"
14.Director Sofia Coppola suggested that her longtime collaborator Kirsten Dunst lose weight for The Beguiled, but she was understanding when Kirsten pushed back against it.
Kirsten told Variety, "It’s so much harder when you’re 35 and hate working out."
15.In 2016, Ashley Benson was told she was "too fat" for a role, to which she responded, "I'm a size 2! I cried for 30 minutes, but then you have to let it roll off your shoulders or it could cause a serious eating disorder."
She told Ocean Drive, "A lot of people in this industry hear they need to lose weight more times than they should. It does make you stronger, though. Because if you let that affect you, you can't be in this industry — you'd go crazy."
16.Hayley Atwell was asked to lose weight while starring in Brideshead Revisited, and her costar Emma Thompson was so furious she threatened to drop out of the film.
Hayley told First Post, "I went round to Emma’s one night, and she was getting very angry that I wasn’t eating all the food she was giving me. I told her why, and she hit the roof.”
17.Kate Beckinsale had just given birth when she auditioned for Pearl Harbor, and director Michael Bay told her she'd "have to work out" if she got the part.
On the Graham Norton Show, she said, "I just didn't understand why a 1940s nurse would do that."
18.In 2007, Ryan Gosling gained 60 pounds to play Jack Salmon in The Lovely Bones, but director Peter Jackson fired him a few days before production began because he "had a different idea of how the character should look."
Ryan told the Hollywood Reporter, "We didn’t talk very much during the pre-production process, which was the problem. It was a huge movie, and there’s so many things to deal with, and he couldn’t deal with the actors individually. I just showed up on set, and I had gotten it wrong."
19.When 19-year-old Kate Upton landed her first magazine cover, "critics were discussing whether [she] was fat or not," but she realized her confidence was "actually meant to inspire women to love themselves for all their different flaws."
In a Facebook Live interview, she said, "I have to thank the people who did that because it really made me sit back and find out who I was and what meant something to me and how I thought about my body. ... They lashed out on me because they felt insecure about themselves."
20.Before she filmed Trainwreck, Amy Schumer was told that "if you weigh over 140 pounds as a woman in Hollywood, if you’re on the screen, it will hurt people’s eyes."
However, after filming wrapped, she returned to her original weight. In her Netflix special Amy Schumer: The Leather Special, she said, "I feel very good in my own skin. I feel strong. I feel healthy. I do. I feel sexy.”
21.And finally, when the fashion industry began telling Tyra Banks she was "too big," she listened to her mother's advice instead: "They will not define you. You will not lose weight for these people."
Tyra told Us Weekly that her mother told her, "Let’s figure out a different clientele. Let’s figure out somebody that can appreciate who you are and who you’re becoming."
If you or someone you know is suffering from an eating disorder or engaging in unhealthy weight control practices, visit the NEDA website for support or call or text their confidential, toll-free hotline at 1-800-931-2237.
