Jurassic World Dominion Director Colin Trevorrow Shot Down A Request To Ask Bryce Dallas Howard To Lose Weight
For better or for worse, the "Jurassic World" saga drew to a close with "Jurassic World Dominion." It's a film that promised to explore the battle between humans and dinosaurs to become Earth's dominant species, only to take a hard turn right and focus instead on a plot that involves giant locusts. The whole thing comes across as an attempt to bring the "Jurassic" movies back to the ideas about chaos (in a scientific sense) and ecosystems that pervade Michael Crichton's original "Jurassic Park" novel and its sequel, "The Lost World."
On the plus side, the "Jurassic" films ending (for now) frees up "Jurassic World" trilogy co-lead Bryce Dallas Howard to go and work on other projects. In-between playing Claire Dearing in those movies, Howard kicked her directing career into gear, doing a stellar job calling the shots on multiple episodes of "The Mandalorian" and "The Book of Boba Fett." Her "Jurassic" role also allowed her to earned her action star stripes, even when she (infamously) had to spend most of the first "Jurassic World" movie running around an island in high heels with dinosaurs on the loose.
That might've not been the case, though, had Howard been forced into losing weight like certain executives on the "Jurassic World" movies wanted. Speaking to Variety on the matter, Howard declined to name any of the guilty parties but confirmed that Colin Trevorrow — who co-wrote all three of the "Jurassic World" films and directed the first and third entries — was very protective of her and shot down any such demands.
'[I've] been asked to not use my natural body in cinema'
Shifting our attention to Trevorrow for a moment: Depending on the year and who you ask, it seems like film buffs can't decide if he's overly ambitious or simply too big for his britches. He's gone from the highs of his acclaimed (and, for my money, very good) 2012 feature directing debut "Safety Not Guaranteed" and his un-made "Star Wars 9" script to the lows of "Dominion" and his bizarrely misguided 2017 drama "The Book of Henry." To his credit, however, Trevorrow has always been vocally supportive of Howard, which speaks well of him as a person.
Likewise, during her interview with Variety, Howard spoke highly of Trevorrow. Explaining she had "been asked to not use my natural body in cinema" in the past, Howard affirmed this "conversation came up again" in the lead-up to production on "Dominion." She explained:
"[Colin] was like, 'There are lots of different kinds of women on this planet and there are lots of different kinds of women in our film.' I got to do so many stunts that wouldn't have been possible if I had been dieting."
"I'm really thrilled [at] all the action I got to do, and I got to do it with my body. [Claire] was at her maximum strength [in 'Dominion'], and I hope it is just yet another indication of what's possible," Howard added. Indeed, we'll be here all day if we start talking about all the ways Hollywood not only fails at promoting body positivity but actively discourages it and promotes unhealthy behavior in the name of attaining unrealistic physical standards. So let's just say good on Trevorrow and Howard for doing their part to counter this widespread problem, and leave it at that.