Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images(LONDON) — Rebel Wilson, who’s played a character named Fat Amy in a pair of Pitch Perfect movies, sees value in gaining weight for the sake of comedy.
In a recent interview with Britain’s The Telegraph, the Australian actress recalls writing her first play and casting herself alongside another actress who was bigger than she was. “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,” she says.
“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.”
Wilson, 36, tells the newspaper that she has a hormonal imbalance that causes her to rapidly gain weight, but can change her body shape if she wanted. “Oh yeah! I’ll take six months off, and just do a total transformation. But then, so many people go: ‘Don’t you do it!’ But I think: ‘Why not?’” she says.
Wilson declares that she saw her size “as being an advantage, whereas so many women see it as a disadvantage.”
Wilson, whose breakout role came in the 2011 hit Bridesmaids, has starred in two movies this year: How to Be Single and the Sacha Baron Cohen comedy The Brothers Grimsby.
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