Brendan Fraser is already receiving a lot of praise for his role in the new film The Whale. This is his first movie in years and he teared up while receiving a standing ovation at the Venice Film Festival. Ahead of the movie’s nationwide premiere in December, Brendan is opening up about how the film changed his perspective on those with a higher body weight. In the film, Brendan plays a man named Charlie who is about 600 pounds.
He said, “I became accustomed to wearing Charlie’s body pretty quickly. I discovered that, once I took it off, I could still feel the sensation of wearing it, almost like an undulation. At the same time, once I took all the applications off at the end of the day, I felt a deepening sense of respect for people who live in that corporal being, because I could remove it like clothing and wardrobe and makeup, and their challenge to do that with their own body is not as sudden.”
Brendan Fraser talks about his newfound respect for those with higher body weights after filming ‘The Whale’
Brendan wanted to do the character justice and worked with the Obesity Action Coalition to make sure he was portraying the mental and physical struggles of his character properly. He added, “It gave me an appreciation for the incredible courage they have to possess themself with for their very survival, and it takes an incredibly strong-willed and physically strong person to live inside a body that is, in Charlie’s case, hundreds and hundreds of pounds.”
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Brendan continued, “In my mind, it looked like it belonged in the Tate Modern gallery. It was that striking to behold. I say this because it’s important to have respect for those who do have that corporal being. I learned almost in a way, poetically, that you need to have incredibly strong will of spirit and body to inhabit a body the size of Charlie’s, and that’s an appreciation that I grew to respect more and more each day.”
The Whale will be released in theaters on Dec. 9.
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