Antonia Campbell-Hughes
attends a premiere on
October 10, 2012 in
London, England.
Getty Images Antonia Campbell-Hughes
attends an afterparty on
October 20, 2009 in
London, England.
Getty Images British Actress’s
Shocking Weight Loss:
How Skinny is Too
Skinny for a Role? October 12, 2012 | By LIz
Neporent The famous acting coach
Constantin Stanislavski once
said, “There are no small parts,
only small actors.” Northern Irish actress Antonia Campbell-Hughes has become the literal embodiment of this
quote by transforming her
naturally slender body into a
gaunt frame for an upcoming
movie role as an Austrian
kidnapping victim. In doing so, she joins the list of
incredibly shrinking actors and
actresses, including Natalie
Portman, Matthew McConaughey, and Christian Bale, who have shed sometimes shocking amounts
of weight for roles. This begs the question: Is
extreme weight loss for the
sake of a movie part good
acting or just a plain bad idea?
And what sort of message does
it telegraph to an audience of impressionable young people,
many of whom are already
weight-obsessed? Jennifer Thomas, Ph.D., the
assistant director of the eating
disorders clinical and research
program at Massachusetts
General Hospital in Boston,
worries that Campbell-Hughes’ drastic downsizing may be
viewed as desirable by some
women, especially those who
are predisposed to an eating
disorder. “Girls and women could easily
look at her picture and think,
‘maybe I should look like that,’”
says Thomas, who hasn’t met
the actress. Thomas says that many of her
patients with anorexia and bulimia do a constant scan of the media in search of quick fix
weight loss tips. If actors
reveal the specifics of how they
whittled down to such a
dangerously low weight,
vulnerable women are likely to try the same tactics even if
they are obviously unrealistic or
unsafe. When Beyoncé went on a 2-
week Master Cleanse to lose 20 pounds for her role in the move
Dream Girls in 2006, juice
fasting quickly became all the
rage despite being condemned
by medical experts. Portman’s
gaunt Black Swan figure inspired a spate of magazine
articles and blogs extolling the
virtues of her punishing diet
and exercise program–though
she herself admitted the
regimen made her feel like she was going to die at times. Shedding too much body fat
can increase the risk of
numerous health issues, says
Thomas, such as loss of periods,
fatigue, anemia, hair loss, and
a weakened immune system. Even if actors gain the weight
back, it can cause long term
problems such as bone loss and
infertility. And people who diet down for
a role may have a tough time
snapping out of anorexic-
mode, says Thomas. (Tracey
Gold, the Growing Pains actress
who nearly died from anorexia, was on a medically supervised
weight-loss plan before
becoming dangerously thin.) So it seems that actors who
emaciate themselves for a
role–whether on their own or
due to pressure from a
director, producer, or company
making a movie–aren’t doing themselves or anyone else any
favors. I’m all for realism on
the big screen, but there should
be a point where the
responsibility to set a healthy
example, and an actor’s personal health, outweigh the
need to portray a super skinny
character.