Posted on 11/21/2004 12:30:36 PM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
It's been a rough few years for Kirstie Alley, 53, and not just because her career has been in a slump. On the episode of Oprah Winfrey's show that aired Nov. 12, Kirstie made a shocking revelation that she hasn't had sex in four and a half years, confessing, "I don't want to have fat sex!"
About 10 months ago, Kirstie told Oprah she faced the fact that she had blown up: At last count her weight was about 260 pounds. Kirstie recalled stripping down and looking at herself in a mirror:
"I have seen myself naked.... I couldn't believe it. And so I just was crushed."
But while Kirstie may be admitting this, what the heavy-set, sexstarved actress isn't saying is that she's also been blowing up at everyone around her! Suffering the strains of weight gain and career pressure, sources say she's been yelling at crew members on the set of her upcoming Showtime TV show, Fat Actress, and has taken to loudly fighting about script changes and location decisions.
Before production began in Los Angeles two months ago, Kirstie seemed perfectly comfortable with the show's premise. In Fat Actress, she plays a fictionalized version of herself, an actress coping with her weight. She joked to producers that they should get her wardrobe in three different sizes to match her weight fluctuations. But once shooting started, says a friend, that happy-go-lucky attitude disappeared faster than the on-set snacks.
"Suddenly, Kirstie's ego kicked in; before this series she didn't seem to care about how she looked," the friend says. In fact, the actress was regularly seen walking around L.A. in frumpy clothes and uncombed hair, even eating pie at House of Pies.
Now, the friend says, "she gets irritable so quickly, makeup has to rush in to dab the sweat off her face." A source says the chainsmoking, popsicle-sucking actress has flown off the handle at the show's cameramen, wardrobers, and makeup artists. The people she's always nice to are the celebs who visit the set as guest stars.
Recently, on line in the cafeteria, Kirstie loudly berated an assistant after a pair of earrings Kirstie needed for an upcoming scene disappeared. "She flipped out," says the source. "The next day, four staff members were fired." Reps for Kirstie did not return Star's calls for comment.
STRESS FACTOR
Kirstie's blow-ups seem to be fueled by major career stress. Fat Actress, which debuts in March 2005, is mostly unscripted, relying on Kirstie's onscreen personality and her ability to adlib. Kirstie has worked little since 2000, when her sitcom Veronica's Closet ended its three-season run, and sources say she is desperate for a comeback.
That may be tough for an actress whose weight has ballooned from 125 pounds during her Cheers days to a high of almost 300. But Kirstie is hoping to make the most of her girth. In one scene, a source says, she gives Kid Rock a lap dance to Sir Mixa- Lot's song "Baby Got Back," featuring the lyrics, "I like big butts."
Meanwhile, sources say she focuses her ire toward the little people on the set --workers both small in waistline and low on the job chain. She keeps that anger in check, though, when it comes to her kids, the source says. Kirstie frequently phones her son William, 12, and daughter Lillie, 10, during the day. Indeed, Kirstie told Oprah that it's her love for her children, whom she enjoys cooking for -- and eating with -- that led her to pack on the pounds.
All that may soon change. Kirstie has mentioned many times that she's concerned for her health and knows she needs to slim down. She recently sold a yet unwritten memoir to Rodale Press called How To Lose Your Ass and Regain Your Life, and she's lost 16 pounds since filming began. OK, it's barely a dent. Which is probably just fine by the show's producers, since they only have a show as long as their fat actress remains just that -- fat.
She takes some kind of drug for depression (Viagra, I think)
*** Are you sure about that! LOL
Positive. I pick it up at Walgreen's every month.
She's been taking it since high school.
CRAP! I meant the other one...
*brain fart*
PROZAC! That's it!
SHEESH!
I don't look at it, I just pay for it.
(She's a stay-at-home Mom)
Okay that's what I thought :-)
C'mon Kirstie, haven't you been reading the tabloids? Your fat! Now you claiming your stupid? We knew that too!
LOL
Idid see her on Oprah( half of the show anyway) she is just a spoiled actress, i honestly dont think they could make it through the day without people guiding them. Her sister lived across the street from my inlaws in Kansas, she was the same size Kirstie is now( maybe a bit smaller) she was very thin till she had her children. She is a math teacher in Ks. To think i used to be so star struck,
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