Actress Rebel Wilson has revealed the torrent of derogatory jokes she copied on the set of the iconic Australian television show that helped launch her career.
In an excerpt from her memoir Rising Rebel, the Pitch Perfect star recalls playing Toula, the overweight girlfriend of a drug-dealing pizza delivery man, in the early 2000s comedy Fat Pizza.
"I was the first recurring female character on Fat Pizza who wasn't a sexy, dumb blonde," Wilson writes.
"Cue the many, many derogatory jokes about my size and appearance."
Wilson said she readily accepted the role of the “big fat whale” but was determined to give “depth” to the character as she struggled to gain a foothold in a male-dominated industry.
“I also tried to hold my own among the guys, mostly improvising my own lines, hoping to catch a joke on camera during a twelve-hour workday, because trust me, no one is going to hand you amazing jokes or material. " she writes.
“Not if you're a woman in the early 2000s and starting at the bottom of TV comedy. You have to fight your way through the door and hold it ajar with your big foot before they close it again.
“I felt like the girl who had gained access to a special club for men. It was very clear to me what they found funny and I followed it. I was on a guys' show, so I had to take her fatphobic jokes directly to my chin. The only thing people cared about was that I was fat and funny. And he was doing both very well.”
camera icon Fat Pizza creator Paul Fenech has expressed his shock and hurt over Rebel Wilson's recent allegations against the hit Australian SBS comedy series. In his upcoming memoir, Wilson, 44, accused the show of making her the butt of "fatphobic" jokes and criticized the work environment he was a part of early in his career. S.B.S. Credit: S.B.S./ S.B.S.
Wilson writes how she was left doubting her talent and questioning her future in a “world where men made all the decisions” after her scripts were repeatedly ignored or rejected on the sketch show The Wedge.
After 29 failed auditions, she finally landed a role in the hit movie Bridesmaids.
The comedy made Wilson an international star. She was cast in six films a fortnight after the release of Bridesmaids, including Pitch Perfect.
Wilson describes the comments she received as a plus-size woman in Hollywood.
“During my early years in Hollywood, I remember getting a lot of comments like, “Oh wow, you're so brave!” They usually meant, "Oh wow, you, with your size twenty body, strutting down a red carpet like you're hot... That's so brave!" or "Oh wow, you're obese and yet you stand in front of the camera and smile. That's so brave!"
“I was always very discouraged by these comments, which 99 percent of the time came from other women.
camera icon Fat Pizza creator Paul Fenech has expressed his shock and hurt over Rebel Wilson's recent allegations against the hit Australian SBS comedy series. In his upcoming memoir, Wilson, 44, accused the show of making her the butt of "fatphobic" jokes and criticized the work environment he was a part of early in his career. S.B.S. Credit: S.B.S./ S.B.S.
“Why am I so fucking brave? Because it's only ME? Because I dare to exist as a plus-size woman in Hollywood? The way women told me this also tended to be along the lines of "I'm glad you're the one doing this...I wouldn't have the courage to do what you do."
“The way they kept talking about being “brave” made me wonder: how many negative comments were these women receiving about their bodies in their daily lives?”
