Protest For Body Sanity
Here’s a protest against insane definitions of “fat”, captured by photographer Jordan Matter:
Caption is:
I had a meeting with a casting director from LA. Without a glance at my headshot or resume, and not even a decent introduction, this stranger looks at me, all 5 feet and 2 inches, 125 pounds of me and says, “You need to lose twenty or gain thirty because where you are right now, I can’t do anything with you.” A bit thrown, but not wanting to be rude, I ask, “Can you elaborate on that?” To which she replied, “Your face says ingenue but it wouldn’t quite work, and I can’t put you as fat best friend because you’re not *exactly* fat.” — Katy, Broadway
sending...
This girl is simply gorgeous; she has the perfect figure with a very pretty face on top of it. She’s not fat, although some (many) other girls are too skinny.
Hmm, I agree. There are a lot of anorexic girls in hollywood, it’s such a shame that there is so much pressure for actors to be extremly thin and beautiful, and to enhance their figure with cosmetic sergury. Apart from the detrimental effects this has on society at large, obtaining a part should have nothing to do with looks anyway.
This world is really screwed up…what´s wrong with that girl? She´s really good looking-unlike those so-called super models: nothing more than heads on poles (like Chupa Chups.) I don´t know who invented the modern ideals of female beauty but they were sick. Seriously, some girls in my school have arms and legs that look like toothpicks. Ay Ay Ay….
Really twisted if a casting director would not get her work because of her figure…
She has a great look, a perfect body shape…
The key thing is can she act!
If you look at history, you would see that in earlier times, the larger you were, size, weight, etc, in a woman’s case, the more you were looked at as a potential partner. It is only in very recent history that the ideals have changed in such a drastic way.
she’s lovely of course, but that’s not the point! no wonder hollywood makes such shitty movies when their criteria for selecting female actresses involves a bathroom scale.
bravo to her for telling people what happened.
“If you look at history, you would see that in earlier times, the larger you were, size, weight, etc, in a woman’s case, the more you were looked at as a potential partner. It is only in very recent history that the ideals have changed in such a drastic way.”
That’s not exactly true. “Ideal” weight has always fluctuated (look at corsets for example, or greek goddesses or somesuch) – it just has never been as low as now.
I don’t necessarily agree with her protest. It’s Acting! If you don’t look the part, then you can’t get the part just because you’re talented. A white guy isn’t going to get the lead role in Raisin in the Sun, a skinny teenage girl is never going to play Mother Courage, and no one but pretty girls who are in shape are going to be the ingenue. Being an actor sometimes means changing your body for a part. That’s the life you chose when you decided to be an actor. Every actor deals with this, no matter what race or sex. Sure, women deal with it more overtly, but male actors (I am one) also feel constantly pressured to work out constantly and lose incredible amounts of fat to look as cut as possible.
I don’t think the casting director was out of line. He didn’t say she couldn’t have a role at her height and weight, he said “I” – “I can’t do anything with you.” He needed either a skinnier girl, or a fatter girl, and she was right in between. Often they are looking for a particular look.
It’s no different than when they cast “leading men.” Some guys are too short to be “leading men,” and Jim Belushi isn’t going to be cast for roles in which Brad Pitt might be considered.
It’s not all that outrageous. No, of course she’s not “fat.” But, there is a difference between what is required to be in roles Mila Kunis might fill and roles Roseanne Barr might fill.