Brendan Fraser Wanted To Make Sure His Body Suit In The Whale Wasn't Going To Be A Joke
Ever since it was announced that Brendan Fraser was starring in Darren Aronofsky's "The Whale," the film adaptation of Samuel D. Hunter's Lucille Lortel Award-winning play of the same name, film fans have been excited about the mainstream cinematic comeback of one of the most beloved movie stars of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Fraser plays Charlie, a 600-lb reclusive English teacher who is trying to mend his fractured relationship with his teenage daughter, Ellie (Sadie Sink). Critical responses to the film have been mixed, but the almost universally accepted belief is that Fraser's performance is a career-best. The role of Charlie is a difficult one to play, not only for the depth required to bring to life a character enduring so much emotional suffering but also because of the pressure of representing a character living in a body typically only shown on screen through exploitative reality TV shows or as a punchline in a juvenile comedy.
Fraser is known for his extreme dedication to his character transformations and has spoken candidly about his previously self-destructive eating habits in preparing for roles like "George of the Jungle." Fraser's preparation for "The Whale" was just as dedicated, but as an actor who has publicly discussed his weight fluctuation and threw himself into learning more about the systemic mistreatment of fat people while researching for the role, he made it a priority to ensure Charlie's body wasn't going to be viewed as a joke. In a recent interview with Adam Sandler as part of Variety's "Actors on Actors" series, Fraser spoke at length about how important it was to provide an authentic humanity to Charlie, especially in a world that dehumanizes fat people for merely existing.
Representing people that actually exist
Much of the discussion surrounding "The Whale" has been centered around Charlie's size, with many forgetting that there are actual people that exist in the world in "infinifat" bodies and that the character's weight is not something to be treated like shock value. Throughout the film, Charlie mentions his personal issues with the healthcare system, something that is unfortunately very real to millions of people. "But the truth of this and I've learned this, is that the healthcare system is such a quagmire that people who live with obesity, who may want to get a bariatric procedure that very well could save their lives, find themselves often in a really unfair limbo," Brendan Fraser told Adam Sandler during their interview. Fraser called the standard "terrible" and "unfair," and indicated this systemic mistreatment was a motivating factor in playing Charlie with as much authenticity as possible.
"The rule was that the whole look should obey the laws of physics and gravity, because we don't see that in films," he said. "I really looked at what the Farrelly brothers did, I looked at what Mike Myers did, what Eddie Murphy did — that's just in the last 20 years." He lamented that a majority of the fat portrayals are "a cut-out silhouette of a costume that's stuffed with batting, and it's just an athletic actor inside the suit, and it was all in the service of a mean joke." Fraser concluded that he felt it important to call this history out because it's demeaning to the very real people harmed by systemic fatphobia. "I felt empowered to be their voice and to be as honest as I could and as authentic as I could in the portrayal."