Ron Lester, who played Billy Bob in Varsity Blues as well as Sugar Daddy on the TV series Popular, is another. Not as famous as Wayne Knight, but I certainly remember him from quite a few guest spots on other shows as well.
Oprah is a wonderful example of this - she has a personal chef and a personal trainer (possibly several). She is followed around by a staff who can give her advice and take care of her issues. And she really seems to be motivated to keep herself relatively healthy (Unlike, say, Brittney Spears, who seems motivated to make as big a trainwreck out of her life as possible). But it seems really, really hard for her - it seems especially difficult when her life gets particularly stressful or extra busy (I have a suspicion Oprah’s life is always busy). I’m sure part of it is genetics, part of it self control, and part of it time. But it certainly isn’t a lack of money she has thrown at it.
(One of the things I like about Oprah - and there are things that I don’t - is that she presents herself as a human being who - despite all her advantages of money and staff - has a hard time with her weight.)
Stephen Furst lost a lot of weight, and I think has kept if off, but it’s been years since I’ve seen him act.
Steve Buscemi.
Oprah is such an example of self-driven motivation and bootstrap-pulling in general (and yeah, there are things that I too don’t like about her), that her weight struggle must be insanely frustrating for her. Yes, she throws an awful lot of money at it, and supposedly works out or runs every day . . . yet right now she seems to be gaining again. I have the feeling that if someone with her inner strength and motivation and resources can’t keep it off, is there any hope for the rest of us fighting the same battle?
I think the answer is that with some battles you have to be happy with a partial victory.
Roseanne was once anorexic and weighed 104 pounds. She was really good looking too.
And knowing that if you are still fighting, you haven’t completely lost. Oprah may be gaining again, but she hasn’t yet fused with her own couch.
Stephen Furst was one that sprang to mind immediately - the difference between him in series 3 and 4 of Babylon 5 was very marked. But then as his wikipedia entry says he has type 2 diabetes (I assumed he had cancer of something) - I’m pretty sure that for a lot of people if it was the choice between weight loss and amputation they’d manage to find a way to lose weight.
Speaking from personal experience my own weight has yo-yoed by about three stone over the course of the last ten years. It was only in 2006 after a good two years of solid effort with diet and rigorous exercise that I managed to actually crack it and consistently lose weight down to about 10 stone (before being hospitalised and being stuck on mother fucking weight gain drugs for six months made me 13 stone in a matter of months - gah!).
Now she’s considered overweight? Society’s standards are unrealistic!
Tom Arnold lost a lot of weight recently. But I think he’s gained some of it back.
To further your point, Drew Carey had Lasik on his eyes several years ago. He no longer needs to wear the glasses, but they are such a part of his image that he still wears the frames without actually having corrective lenses in them.
My cousin is a heavy actress. She told me once that maintaining that weight–it defines the kinds of roles she gets, after all–is contracted with her agent; if she falls below a certain weight, it’s a breach of contract. Now, IANAEL, so I don’t know if that’s enforceable; and she’s very close friends with her agent, so I’m sure they’d work something out. But obviously it’s a factor.
I was going to say that. I’ve actually asked the question of him…
“He’s American. Americans have good teeth and dental plans and all that. Why not Steve”
I have wonky teeth (though regularly cleaned). My excuse is I’m British.
Speaking of teeth, Kirsten Dunst. She has had the front four teeth whitened but the rest are obviously discolored and it is quite noticeable on the big screen. She certainly must have enough money to get all her teeth whitened or get veneers so why hasn’t she?
It’s true. I saw him in an old commercial once for something (Red Wing Shoes?) and he was a total fucking stud. The commercial was pretty old, so he was fairly young, too. He was so thin and hot that he was basically unrecognizable (his voice gave him away). I would’ve done him in a minute.
He lost quite a bit of weight in between filming Sicko and doing the press for it. It came up more than once in the interviews I saw.
David Bowie.
I thought so too, for years, but I think he finally had them fixed.
Anybody remember the time he was a guest on Letterman, and instead of entering from the side of the stage, he came in through the back of the auditorium and proceeded to do cartwheels all the way down the aisle, and then collapsed into a chair and sat there as a profusely sweating, gasping-for-breath, quivering pile of lard? The look on Letterman’s face was one of completely dumbfounded, incredulous disbelief.
‘Weird Al’ Yankovic, on the other hand, was in the same boat with the glasses being an integral part of his image, but when he got the Lasik done he completely revamped his image.
Roseanne’s mouth weighs more than 104 lbs.