Rebel Wilson says she landed more acting jobs once she started gaining weight.
Rebel Wilson is one of those actresses that are instantly recognizable. A lot of people know her for role in Pitch Perfect franchise but, she has a long history in Hollywood with several feature films and commercials including Night at the Museum 3, The Brothers Grimsby (opposite Sacha Baron Cohen), andBridesmaids, to name but a few.
The actress recently appeared in the new movie Absolutely Fabolous, but her main project is in London’s West End revival of Guys and Dolls. Wilson explained that she has her own plus size clothing line and, given her edgey personality and confidence, she sees herself as an inspiration for women everywhere. However, Wilson explains she was lucky to get her break in the first place. Wilson explains she had several bad poor auditions for one of the lead roles in Bridesmaids but, director Paul Feig and producer Judd Apatow saw something in her that they knew moviegoers would like, and so they created a small part especially for her, which she completely embodied and built into an amazing role.
“I really could have ended up having zero lines in that,” Wilson admits. “It did pop, and people went: ‘She’s interesting. We want to see more of that girl.’ And one of the movies I got from that was Pitch Perfect, which turned out to be a mega franchise.”
“I think a lot of the reason I get hired is because they know I’m going to embellish the script. And I kind of think in Hollywood, if you don’t have that ability, you’re not going to last too long in comedies. You can be a dramatic actor, fine – it’s not like you’re going to be improvising: ‘Oh my god, I killed my son’. But in comedies, if you’re not adding, you’re probably going to be a bit forgotten, in the edit.”
Even though size should not be a major issue in Hollywood, it really is. Wilson says when she first started out, she found she gained more laughs when she was bigger. She consciously traded a fitness lifestyle and decided to gain weight and it worked.
“There’s something about me that people like laughing at,” she explains. “And I was like: ‘Oh. That girl’s getting a lot of laughs, a lot easier than me. What is it?’ Because I don’t think there’s much difference in talent. And I remember distinctly thinking: ‘I think it’s because she’s fatter’. And then, I don’t know if it was mega-conscious, but I thought: ‘How can I get more laughs? Maybe if I was a bit fatter…’ And then suddenly I was fatter, and doing comedy.”
“I saw my size as being an advantage,” she says, “whereas so many women see it as a disadvantage”.
Wilson says that being big has helped her stand out. “People just don’t think,” she says. “Even though this is a creative field, it is a business. When you looked at the actors around me at the Australian Theatre for Young People, I wouldn’t have thought I was the most talented. But I was definitely unique, and I definitely had the entrepreneurial brains.”
Via The Telegraph
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