premiered on the opening night of the 66th London Film Festival yesterday evening. With rousing songs, a much-loved source-text and a star-studded cast, it’s an all-round stirring entertainment smash with just one niggling problem—two of the characters are wearing fat suits.
And, frustratingly, fat suits are nothing new. John Travolta wore one as Edna Turnblad in Hairspray, Courtney Cox became ‘Fat Monica’ by donning one in Friends, and Gwyneth Paltrow wore one in the 2001 movie Shallow Hal. Even the child who plays Bruce Bogtrotter in the latest adaptation of Matilda joins Emma Thompson by strapping one to his.
The persistence fat suits have in the film industry is genuinely astounding given how vocal body positivity pioneers and viewers have been about the harm and hurt they can cause. As those in opposition have explained, fat suits are dangerous because they offer a sort of reserve . Like paparazzi photos, they incite fat phobia within viewers to look at a thin actress wearing fictional weight and think: ‘God I can’t believe she looks like