Hollywood Beefs Up for a Good Laugh

Hollywood is getting fat.

With increasing frequency, actors on screens big and small are slipping into fat suits for laughs. Comedian Martin Short is the latest actor to weigh in.

Short’s half-hour show “Primetime Glick” had its premiere on Comedy Central last week. With the help of makeup and a fat suit, Short transforms into celebrity interviewer Jiminy Glick, the overweight, jolly and clueless host of a fictitious talk show.

“What Marty wears is a classic fat suit,” said Carolee Fisher, “Primetime Glick” costume designer. “It’s covered in a nude nylon fabric and stuffed with a polyfiber fill. He just steps into it, and I Velcro it up the back.”

Following in his fat footsteps July 20 will be Julia Roberts, who slaps on a 190-pound suit for the romantic comedy “America’s Sweethearts.” Then, in a movie due out Nov. 9, Gwyneth Paltrow dons a prosthetic suit to portray an obese woman in another romantic comedy, “Shallow Hal,” directed by the Farrelly brothers (“There’s Something About Mary”).

The past year or two gave us a smorgasbord of swollen actors: Eddie Murphy in the “Nutty Professor” movies, Martin Lawrence in “Big Momma’s House,” Mike Myers as Fat Bastard in “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.” On television, there’s NBC’s “Friends,” where Monica (Courteney Cox) appears in a fat suit during flashbacks to her high school years as an overweight teen.

Who knows, maybe a fat suit is in Calista Flockhart’s future.

Clearly, studios have concluded that grossly overweight people make audiences laugh. They howl when Fat Bastard grunts, “Get in my belly,” or when a lean Eddie Murphy morphs into a plump Klump.

Yet some people aren’t laughing.

“Unfortunately, it’s funny to people,” said Dr. Lisa Berzins, director of women’s behavior medicine and the eating-disorder program at Manchester Memorial Hospital in Hartford, Conn. “For people who struggle with their weight, it’s not funny at all. The sad thing is people will pay more attention to a person dressed up in a fat suit than a fat person.”

Berzins says that fat suits send the message to society that it’s OK to make fun of overweight people.

“It reinforces the prejudice that’s already there in society. People think it’s fair game to poke fun at people who are fat,” Berzins said. “I guess Hollywood is capitalizing on that.”

Although Glick’s weight doesn’t seem to be the show’s focus, the celebrity guests dish out the fat jokes. During Glick’s interview with “Politically Incorrect” host Bill Maher last Wednesday, Maher commented, “You look great. Have you lost weight? I think you’ve found it again.”

The previews for today’s program show comedian Jerry Seinfeld yelling at Glick, “You’re overweight.”

Berzins concedes that, on the Glick premiere, it was funny to see Short transformed.

“The fat suit added to the buffoonery. By doing a caricature whose appearance is very different from his own, that adds to the humor,” Berzins said. “This show didn’t cross the line as far as poor taste of poking fun at people. My guess is that it will escalate.”

And as it does it will feed into the stereotype, she said, “of being fat and jolly.”

Although Fisher has noticed more actors using fat suits, she said these suits have been around for years and are available in costume houses, from full-body casts, to upper and lower bodysuits. Fisher said people find Short’s fat suit funny, not because he’s overweight but because his character is funny.

However, sexy, thin stars such as Roberts and Paltrow stepping into fat suits puts a new spin on things. “At this moment, it’s especially curious when there’s two beautiful women involved,” Fisher said.