comment #1

BurmaShave says ...

What the hell happened last night? Did her publicists get to you? Do they have something on you?

comment #2

IClavdivs says ...

Maybe it is time to stop digging into ribs with gusto. She has accumulated enough fat already to start having "ample" parts of certain body parts. Enough already. Plump is barely OK, fat is not pretty in any form.

comment #3

T. Holly says ...

She looks like a penguin. They have ribs and chicken table service at the bowl? I remember salmon or chicken, red or white, and it was pretty lousy.

comment #4

Rod32303 says ...

The cool thing about Blonsky, other than she is wildly talented and owns "Hairspray," is that she is a normal girl. At least she comes off that way. And she's ONLY 19.

She reminds me of the kids I teach - and I think she would probably give a rats ass about someone who believes that plump is barely ok, and that fat is not pretty in any form. Does that go for the fat that comes out as "opinion" a couple posts up?

She could probably beat the shit out of IClavdivs. If she couldn't, I could.

comment #5

Noah says ...

She's from my hometown, actually and I hear she's a doll. And until someone can tell me what her blood pressure or cholesterol count is, people need to stop referring to her as unhealthy. Maybe she doesn't suit your criteria for attractiveness, that's fine, but don't bash the poor girl for not caring that she doesn't look like every other fucking star in Hollywood.

comment #6

BurmaShave says ...

Noah, you keep making this blood pressure and cholesterol argument, it's absurd. Extreme obesity is unhealthy in any form. It puts an undue strain on the heart, and invariably cuts years off someone's life. Is there any doubt she would be healthier fifty pounds less? I'm speaking as an overweight man myself. I assume you are as well from your sensitivity. None of us in any form of overweight form consider ourselves to be healthy. Talk to a doctor, you really need an education. And Nikki Blonsky needs someone close to her to sit down and help her focus on getting some self control. Laugh now, cry later. Eat all the ribs you want, fine.

comment #7

alynch says ...

I've read some people refer to her as "morbidly obese", and that just makes me wonder how far out of touch those people are.

comment #8

gruver1 says ...

Wells to alynch: She is morbidly obese. There's large-framed, big-boned, pleasantly plump folks. And then there's just plain fat, meaning too much weight and the person has to think about exercise and change of diet. And then there's morbidly obese, which is to say mountain of whipped cream, Jabba, sea lion. At her age, believe me, Blonsky is in the third category. I shudder to think of her condition 12 to 15 years hence...forget it. If she doesn't wise up, I mean.

comment #9

BurmaShave says ...

alynch, you do know that morbidly obese is a technical term, right?

comment #10

Ian Sinclair says ...

I once picked up a skeleton that once belonged to person who was "big-boned" with the tip of my little finger. So could a little girl.

comment #11

T. Holly says ...

I'd like to be her agent and get her one really big sexy fat-girl role to make an "important" statement with, like Davine, and then send her to the BevHills doc who slims everyone down. You know, the very intensive, expensive, exclusive, healthy, long-term one, who sells you all your meals and includes AA style anonymous group therapy and is virtually 100% successful.

comment #12

Moneypenny says ...

Wells, what happened to the article from last night?

comment #13

malibugigolo says ...

Why does living life always mean consuming something?

Sounds more like the behavior of a rabid wolf.

Wells and his fat person stories, it should be a weekly profile of someone that is obese, not in-depth, but wide...

comment #14

erniesouchak says ...

It must have been hard to be fat on a set that included skeletors Michelle Pfeiffer and Christopher Walken and a fat actor who could disguise his blubber by exaggerating it. Why don't articles about Travolta and Alec Baldwin make a point of mentioning what they're eating? And why don't articles about Nicole Kidman make a point of mentioning that she's NOT eating? On another note, Blonsky is cute, but she never impressed me as a great talent. (Elijah, the kid in the photo with her, is another story.) Given her appearance, I predict a career in television. We'll probably see Jennifer Hudson there before long, too.

comment #15

Noah says ...

Burma, being overweight would only put strain on your heart if you had an increased blood pressure or a high cholesterol count. Other than that, being overweight wouldn't really do anything to you. I'm actually a rather slender human being, but I don't understand why we can't just be different shapes and sizes and be cool with that. You are unhappy with your weight, she is not, leave it at that. Queen Latifah is the same way and she seems to be pretty healthy and happy. Jeff wants to use names like "Jabba" and whatnot simply because he likes being pseudo-offensive and if you want to join him, then go for it but I think you are both being rather elitist and foolish.

comment #16

Arran says ...

You guys do realise that being large does not necessarily equal extremely unhealthy any more than skinny automatically means healthy, right? There are many many folk who have trouble putting on weight but still eat nothing but foods from the whipped, congealed and chocotastic food groups, and are at greater health risk than overweight people.

My point being: I'd hit it (Blonsky, that is).

comment #17

Breedlove says ...

side note - If you type in "Jeffrey Wells" on Wikipedia it automatically redirects to some random child molester. Just sayin'.

comment #18

corey3rd says ...

she's being positioned as Jennifer Hudson minus Andre Talley

comment #19

Moneypenny says ...

I saw that as well, Breed. Kind of creepy

comment #20

Rod32303 says ...

You guys suck. Only a few talk about her TALENT or her ACTING...even the NYTimes article is about HER, not her fucking weight.

Half this fucking nation is morbidly obese. I guess it comes with the territory, but feigned concern is really just catty bullshit. There have always been overweight stars...just not sites to criticize. Who the fuck cares? And why is it the FAT stars get critcized...where was all this concern when Angelina was doing her press for "A Mighty Heart?" Ever seen her in person? I have. Talk about skeletal. She looked sick.

comment #21

BurmaShave says ...

Actually Rod32303, there were literally scores of stories, both in the tabloids, and in asides in mainstream articles, about Jolie's shocking weight loss. It was atributed usually to depression about the death of her mother.

But no one was holding her out a paragon of normality and health. You didn't see any bullshit interviews with her where she said "My agent said 'We're concerned that you're only 105 pounds, you should really try gaining some weight. We're worried'. I said thanks, um, that's some advice I'm just not ever going to take!"

We wish health and prosperity on these stars because we enjoy watching them and would miss them if they were gone. I'm obviously not there yet on Blonsky, but I certainly wish her well. That's what I hope she realizes she need to lose weight. I think it's actually dangerous for someone of her morbid size to be embraced without comment. There is no moral relativism when it comes to health.

comment #22

The Winchester says ...

Who cares what she's eating. I wanna know what her thread count is.

comment #23

LYTrules says ...

Ricki Lake dropped a bunch of weight after becoming famous as the fat girl in the original. No reason history can't repeat.

comment #24

malibugigolo says ...

high high thread count one would hope.

comment #25

Griff says ...

She did really bring tremendous energy to the part. And bless her heart for just being who she is. There probably is a lot of peace in that. However, no matter how good she was, she couldn't overcome the jarring dissonance I felt whenever Travolta was on the screen. It was stunt casting, a guy in a fat suit playing a woman. Why couldn't they get an authentically largish woman of notable talent and pipes like Kathy Najimy to do the role?

comment #26

le corbeau says ...

Jesus, reading the comments here I'm sure glad I live in Chicago, where the girls still look like girls and not like boy track stars with boob jobs.

comment #27

mdc says ...

I've been trying to think of a film in which a fatty is allowed to be sexy. All I can come up with is Fassbinder's "Jail Bait", a great little film. Eva Matthes was about 17 or 18 I think. She wasn't anywhere near Blonsky-big, and she slimmed down later, but she was pretty big nonetheless. She was terrific in the part, genuinely sexy. Arran would do her.

There was also the great Junkyard Sal in "Ultra-Vixens". A very impressive full-figure-gal. But more funny than sexy.

comment #28

Rod32303 says ...

"Renee Zellweger is a ghost. You can see her vertebrae, which is gross. Seriously, can the girl please GAIN about twenty pounds? Oh yeah, she just got nominated for an Oscar."

"Nicole Kidman is a stick! I shudder to think of her condition in ten years if she keeps this up, losing weight."

"Jesus, can Keira Knightly get ANY skeletal? There is in shape, then there's skinny, where the person has to think about sitting around on their ass and eating more. Then there's anorexic, which is to say emaciated, deathlike, undernourished."

Yeah, okay, there's no double standard here.

Let the girl enjoy this. SHE'S NINETEEN - hopefully she will live a happy and health(ier) life, but the part she plays CALLS FOR SOMEONE OF HER WEIGHT.

comment #29

le corbeau says ...

From Broadway Else-Where, by J. Pierpoint Wells, 1891:

Visiting the Rialto to reacquaint myself with the charms of Miss Lillian Russell, surrounded by stevedores with shirts of the coarsest muslin and smelling of garlic, I could not help but note that Miss Russell has-- how can I put this delicately-- acquainted herself rather too readily with the oyster platter, the scrapple bowl, the cherries jubilee tray. She looked more ready to battle John L. Sullivan than to essay the part of Patience. I fear for the consequences of her health if she cannot drop a few stone and get back to a modest, girlish 150 or so.

comment #30

George Prager says ...

I love this thread.

comment #31

btwnproductions says ...

Got this off a website: "The term 'morbid obesity' refers to patients who are 50 - 100% -- or 100 pounds above -- their ideal body weight. Alternatively, a BMI (body mass index) value greater than 39 may be used to diagnose morbid obesity."

I don't think Blonsky fits into this category, but then again, the weight is part and parcel with her character and I had no issue with it. Have another rib on me, Nikki, you're large and in charge!

comment #32

George Prager says ...

"Jesus, reading the comments here I'm sure glad I live in Chicago, where the girls still look like girls and not like boy track stars with boob jobs"

Yeah. Instead, you have "Trixies"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trixie_(woman)

comment #33

BurmaShave says ...

Griff I think you've asked this on other threads, and it's absurd. Casting a man in the part of Edna is the tradition of HAIRSPRAY. Get over it. Of course it's stunt casting. I think maybe you're spinning SISTER ACT too much. Grow up. Rock and roll. Deal with it.

comment #34

George Prager says ...

Casting Kathy Najimy to star in HAIRSPRAY would be like Spielberg casting Judge Reinhold to play Abe Lincoln. These are major motion pictures we're talking about, not something on the Lifetime channel. No one want to pay 10 bucks to see fuckin' Kathy Najimy.

comment #35

Craig Kennedy says ...

I'm not agreeing with Griff, but the one difference between Travolta and Divine and Fierstein is that the latter two didn't need fat suits. The fat suit thing puts me off. It's just been a cliche of too many bad movies. Ok, thinking back there may have been padding with either of the other two, but it wasn't the full on prosthetic thing...was it?

comment #36

George Prager says ...

The fat suit and the guy in drag is part of the mystique of the movie. I guess they should've always cast someone with a huge nose to play Cyrano.
Travolta is fat anyway.

comment #37

Craig Kennedy says ...

Fake noses are always funny.

comment #38

Griff says ...

The whole Fierstein/Divine thing just seems a little too much like modern day blackface. Just in this case, we were dealing with homosexuals (Waters, Fierstein) talking about a lifestyle they may not have had intimate acquaintance with, rather than white men mocking the negras and their pretensions. That's the part that throws off my grown up, rock and rock, deal with it-ness.

comment #39

PanTheFaun says ...

Fierstein DID need a fat suit. No facial prosthetics though. But he definitely did wear extra padding around his body.

comment #40

IClavdivs says ...

Yes, Rod, plump is barely OK. People like her are asked to pay for an extra seat because of the fat by some airlines. And as for her beating me up? please, by the time, she lifts her arms at this stage, she'd be wheezing.

Girls/women don't need the extra layers of fat to be womanly or "real", when you start acquiring moulds of flesh and end up looking like a version of the Michelin tyre, it is time to start taking power walks, leave the tubs of ice cream and chicken ribs! Things should be done in moderation.

comment #41

le corbeau says ...

Clav, you can talk like the things you say are obviously the way things are meant to be, but the fact is you live in the only culture in history that has ever prized a starvation look as the exemplar of sexy, and one of the few that wished its girls looked more like boys with narrow waists, clearly defined muscles and chiseled facial features. Things should indeed be done in moderation.

comment #42

IClavdivs says ...

mgmax, so?

comment #43

Aunt Sassy says ...

"I just think it means living life to the fullest."

What do you know about living life to the fullest? You've made a bad marriage, obsess about weight (both male and female), project a sexual identity that is both repressed and retarded, bitch and moan about not getting into every movie for free, hit up your readers for crash pads at film festivals, and you used to work for Cannon films, fer chrissakes!!

Nikki Blonsky, on the other hand, can sing, dance and act. If she dropped dead of heart failure while clutching a rib in her chubby little fist, she will still most likely have lived a happier, richer life in her brief time on this earth than you have in your angry, bitter, miserable, skinny existence.

comment #44

le corbeau says ...

You left out "and he operates a website where he tolerates people being unspeakably nasty to him."

Sheesh, folks, I'll mock Wells for hating fat (non-anorexic) people and being a total coastal lefty, and Wells mocks Wells for some of it too (you do realize that every reference to low thread counts since the first one has been tongue in cheek flamebait, right?), but some of the personal attacks, I dunno, maybe it's just my low-thread-count BBQ-eating red state manners that makes me cringe at some of that stuff sometimes.

comment #45

Rod32303 says ...

Have you seen her, IClavius? Because she looks even thinner now (just caught her on the today show) than she did in the movie. She's not THAT big.

And she dances, LIFTS HER ARMS PLENTY, does splits and sings in her movie. Whipping your sorry ass wouldn't even take her lifting her arms.

Maybe she will lose weight. SHE IS NINETEEN for fuck's sake. She's an actress in a movie, not a spokesperson for overweight women, and when asked about her weight, she just said she's comfortable with who she is. You don't get to speak for her and I doubt she warranted the comments ABOUT her, but this is the day and age, so have fun. While you bitch and rant on your computer, her movie just grossed almost 30 million dollars in three days. And please do tell what women and girls need to be womanly. No doubt you know.

Think about moderation the next time you decide to give insensitive comments or act like some authority on anything other than your own life.

And "tire" is spelled with an "i," not a "y."