Vanity Fair star Olivia Cooke reveals how a director told her to lose weight at 18 – and refused her a cookie
Vanity Fair star Olivia Cooke has told how a TV director told her to lose weight for a role when she was a thin teenager.
The actress, who is set to star in Game Of Thrones prequel House Of The Dragon, says her fellow cast members were forced to sneak onto the set when she was 18 years – and ten years later, she is still traumatized by his comments.
At the time, Ms Cooke, now 28, appeared in two TV series – Blackout, alongside Christopher Eccleston, and The Secret Of Crickley Hall, with Suranne Jones.
Although both shows appeared on the BBC, they were made by independent production companies.
She said: “I realized pretty early on that aesthetics and how people perceive your body is very important. For one of my first jobs, the director asked me to lose weight for the role. I was already very thin, but I was young. I was 18, so I had a chubby face because I was a kid. I was like, ‘Oh my God, I’m in the movies, someone asked me to lose weight. That happens.
HOW SHE CHANGED: Olivia at the House Of The Dragon premiere
“I remember the cast found out they asked me to lose weight, because I was limiting what I ate, so they started giving me food on the sly. I’m still traumatized to this day. .
Ms Cooke, who played Becky Sharp in ITV’s Vanity Fair dramatization, also said the man teased her with a plate of sweet snacks.
She added, “He went to give me a note and had a big plate of cookies in front of him.
“He was eating the cookies and he said, ‘Oh, not for you! I was just like, “Shut up!”
“I think it’s changed a bit now, but maybe they’re more sneaky, they know how to phrase it now.”
The star – set to be unveiled as the face of Garrard jewellery, a favorite of the Queen – says she noticed she had cellulite when she was nine but tries not to be shy upset about his body.
Teenage Olivia in The Secret of Crinkley Hall
She said: “I remember looking in the mirror and saying, ‘I actually have cellulite.
“Maybe it was a good thing to know that women have cellulite, they have wobbly parts and people are wobbly because they have fat, they have skin, that they have texture.” They are just bodies.
“So I never really tried to fight that because I know that’s not how my body should look like.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I sometimes fall down the rabbit hole of Instagram and look at people’s fake, photoshopped bodies and stuff like that.”
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