00:00:00
it was the worst professional experience of my career and this was before the me too movement I felt humiliated and
00:00:07
degraded what can you say about that experience Rebel Wilson an awardwinning
00:00:14
Hollywood Superstar okay here we go my dad would say horrible things to my mom
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fat lazy cow no one will ever love you and I had issues with food cuz I had low
00:00:25
self-worth and that's why I would trash my body I felt my life wasn't going to be anything but then I found
00:00:31
motivational tapes that said the brave put down their fears and go forward and
00:00:36
so I decided to go out into the world and make a name for myself and then I noticed on stage that people like
00:00:41
laughing at bigger people I thought I could use this to my advantage I gained all this weight my body was like at 102
00:00:48
kilos and then I came to America now I'm making millions of dollars from playing the fat funny girl I'm living this
00:00:54
amazing life but you achieve it and then it's not enough and there was still a virgin never dated properly and this
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biological clock you could hear it going I went to the fertility doctor and
00:01:07
the doctor looks me up and down and goes you're not healthy and it like really sunk in I've got to fix this but as soon
00:01:14
as I started telling people in my team they're like oh no no no why would you want to lose weight cuz then you lose your multi-million dollar career you're
00:01:21
just going to throw it away was that your hardest moment no the darkest point in my life was when I was 13 and
00:01:31
congratulations Dio gang we've made some progress 63% of you that listen to this podcast regularly don't subscribe which
00:01:38
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00:01:44
liked any of the videos we've posted if you like this channel can you do me a quick favor and hit the Subscribe button it helps this channel more than you know
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and the bigger the channel gets as you've seen the bigger the guest get thank you and enjoy this episode
00:01:57
[Music] rebel I I think to understand somebody
00:02:03
you have to understand their earliest context and as I read through your book
00:02:09
Rebel Rising which is out now I was surprised in many ways but also the
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person that I'd seen on a screen made sense in a bunch of different ways so let me throw that question to you as the
00:02:20
first question which is if I if I was to Endeavor to understand you what do I need to know about your earliest
00:02:27
context yeah I guess some people say on screen and they have this image of what you are like um and often I guess people
00:02:35
would think some overly confident uh very confident in her
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sexuality and uh you know just a kind of brash ballsy person but uh from my
00:02:51
upbringing I mean I think I couldn't be more the opposite I mean I grew up in a
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pretty regular Suburban Australian up springing but was extremely shy to the
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point where like you'd never think that I would choose entertainment for a career like that would just be
00:03:09
unimaginable uh for this ex like bordering on some kind of social disorder shyness and and then coming from quite a
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humble beginning of being in a family where we made money selling pet products out of a yellow Caravan at dog shows and
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so driving around the country to these dog shows and selling like pooper scoopers to pick up the poop for the
00:03:32
dogs and uh brushes and leads for the dogs and and all these things and so it
00:03:37
wasn't also I was allergic to dogs so that's why my uh my childhood always
00:03:43
felt a little bit uncomfortable which I never realize why until later when I got tested as an adult um that I was
00:03:49
allergic and H and so I think by by writing the book uh people can see this
00:03:57
whole other dimension of me and kind of maybe why I have the
00:04:02
personality that that I have now what about your parents so my mom was a
00:04:09
school teacher in in state schools um so had a lot of like Refugee students and
00:04:15
students that came in not knowing English and and she mainly taught kindergarten so like all these kids so
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she's just like a light you know light of a woman like just a brilliant teacher
00:04:27
helped so many young people and some parts of my childhood she was just a stay-at-home um Mom which I shouldn't
00:04:33
say just cuz now I'm realizing uh being a mom is like the hardest thing ever and
00:04:39
then my dad was someone who his his father died uh suddenly when he was 18
00:04:45
in his final year of high school uh so uh I think that through his life what
00:04:52
was supposed to be his life off course and he kind of had emotional issues from
00:04:58
from losing his dad suddenly that young um and in a tragic way so he um he had I
00:05:06
believe you know wanted to be a businessman and wanted to be successful but I guess because of his own emotional
00:05:13
issues and stuff didn't quite fully achieve his his potential how do
00:05:20
you know that your father didn't quite achieve his potential what were like the
00:05:25
symptoms of that CU you seem to be quite sure that that that was um in something I think cuz he was so angry all the time
00:05:32
and money was a source of um uh fighting in the in the household
00:05:39
so H and I just like so for example we'd go to the racetrack with the horses and
00:05:45
my dad sometimes would own like a oneth or 12th of a racehorse in a Syndicate um
00:05:52
and he'd look at the other High Flyers rich people who had had a lot of money
00:05:58
and were successful and people people knew their names and stuff and I definitely saw that he wanted to be that
00:06:05
but he wasn't that nobody was coming up to him and shaking his hand or admiring him and then in in one of the um
00:06:13
chapters of the book I write about I found this gym bag in the back of his car and I was full of all these
00:06:20
cassettes and I just took them nobody ever said anything uh why they were
00:06:25
there or what and I noticed they were all motivational tapes um and the one
00:06:31
that I clearly remember was one called How to Win Friends and Influence People and I think this was my father's way of
00:06:40
trying to improve himself and trying to be better and a lot of the tapes were about business about selling and um how
00:06:47
to be better in in business and and so I feel like what even though we never
00:06:53
openly discussed it I feel like why would he have those kind of things cuz he wanted to better himself just don't
00:06:59
think he had the the ability to and then his life just didn't go in the way that
00:07:05
he wanted to and I think uh because of the death of his father he just never seemed to be able to process
00:07:12
emotions properly um that was the best way probably nowadays you would go to
00:07:18
someone and get diagnosed with what kind of issues you had or seek therapy or or
00:07:24
something like that to get over the trauma but I guess back in Australia in those days that wasn't thing um and so
00:07:31
he was a man who just you know wanted to be better but then just couldn't like uh
00:07:37
just didn't have the skills the emotional skills that trauma eventually finds an outlet either way if you don't
00:07:43
address it through like therapy it finds other ways to manifest itself and what were those ways and I think with him it
00:07:49
was being H angry and he would just turn from all of a sudden talking normally to
00:07:57
he would go really red in the face like just like like uh just it was almost
00:08:02
like a red balloon suddenly like his face would almost expand and he go really red and he'd just have these
00:08:08
absolutely like Angry outbursts where he' do and say horrible things and and I
00:08:14
think that that was probably stemming from when he lost his father in an unfair way um and and he just didn't
00:08:22
know how to deal with it so probably like you know if he was now and if you
00:08:28
know I would be like oh you know you should talk to someone a professional
00:08:33
and process your emotions properly and but but then back then I guess we didn't
00:08:38
we didn't really know what to do or say that was just his personality to bring this into into light I guess the the
00:08:44
example you given in the book is when you I think you were 12 or something years old and you decide you were young
00:08:49
it was the summer it was hot and you decided to wet the bed to cool yourself down mhm yeah we got back from a dog
00:08:55
show and it was really hot sometimes in Australia we have like these really hot
00:09:01
like 36° days and so we thought well we'll pour water all over the mattress
00:09:07
to like wet it down so we'd kind of be lying in coolness um and then my father came in
00:09:12
and just he thought I think we'd literally wet the bed you know like gone to the toilet on the bed which we never
00:09:18
would have done we were like looking back we were like the most well- behaved children you could imagine um and he
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just like he just it was like a flick switch would flick you know and he'd
00:09:32
just go really angry and would just start whacking us and it was just
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um it was I don't know it just seemed to it just something would tick him off or
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something and he'd Just Lose It um and that was one of the incidents but I was
00:09:50
really young I think I was about eight okay and my sister was Six Liberty and when I spoke to her about writing the
00:09:57
book and she was like she doesn't totally remember that exact instance but she remembers several others that are
00:10:03
very similar MH um things but that one I just remembered really clearly and then
00:10:09
I felt like a terrible person cuz I thought oh well why did I wet the sheets and the mattress and I was trying to
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cool down but that was wrong and I should never been naughty like that um
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and it just kind of um yeah really stuck to me that that particular time but that
00:10:27
was something that would happen you know quite a bit and this sort of physical aggression and emotional
00:10:35
abuse would continue to your mother as well it would extend to your mother as well yeah more with my mom it was more
00:10:42
emotional abuse like um come home and say oh fat lazy cow what have you done
00:10:48
all day um stuff like oh you know when to over love you um just like these
00:10:56
comments that would just come constantly and also more financial abuse like he'd
00:11:01
take control of the finances but then go and gamble with the money and then we'd
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have no money and um so so more with that um but with the kids it was more
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the you know the physical hitting which was not was not that uncommon in the area I grew up in I mean I know now like
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I could never think of hitting my child now I just would never but back then it
00:11:28
it was quite common and we did have family friends that their dad would hit them with a belt which was kind of a bit
00:11:33
even worse um so we kind of felt like like we didn't know anything that
00:11:38
different it was quite common I I ask those particular questions because it I
00:11:43
often think that we learn our first model of what love is and what a relationship is by what we observe with our parents and for me I know for sure
00:11:51
that watching my parents how they interacted left me with a message that I absolutely do not want to be in a romantic relationship and I avoided that
00:11:58
for my whole life yeah that's probably why I never dated anybody ever um
00:12:05
because I saw my parents my mom kind of became a shell of a woman and had to
00:12:11
have every ounce of strength in order to get out of that relationship eventually when I was like 16 17 and that left me
00:12:18
thinking I will never get married um I I don't want to be in a
00:12:24
partnership with somebody like this is terrible uh because often when my dad
00:12:29
would have his Outburst or whatever it was always at home it was not in public it was not around other people it was
00:12:34
like just just when we were at home and I went who would want that like there
00:12:39
was nothing loving about it and and I think even though I had one boyfriend
00:12:46
when I was 16 and and then he uh cheated on me with a friend and and then I was
00:12:51
like that's it and and then from then throughout the whole of my teenage and 20s like did not date one person
00:13:00
because I guess I I didn't want to be like my mother and and have this like
00:13:07
awful thing happen that you know obviously now the story is great for my mom she's now um engaged to a great man
00:13:14
and who's awesome and so kind and loving but uh my only representation I guess
00:13:21
was their marriage and it was awful like it was just even when they separated it took seven years to uh where and
00:13:29
basically left them my mom with nothing because all the money went to the lawyers um from the separation costs and
00:13:36
I was just like oh like why would I want that I go no I would like to be
00:13:42
successful and go out into the world and make a name for myself and a romantic relationship would only cause me pain
00:13:50
only drag me down uh not allow me to be my true self um so I thought yeah I just thought
00:13:58
I would never never i' never wanted one until you get real lonely when you
00:14:04
become successful and then you're like oh maybe maybe things can change what am I going to do with all this stuff yeah I
00:14:11
think some of my darkness comes this is a quote from your book I think some of my darkness comes from my dad there is definitely convict history on that side
00:14:18
of my family a lot of dodginess when you say a lot of my darkness it's it's interesting because I remember sitting
00:14:24
with Tim Grover who I reference a lot and Tim Grover was the guy who coached Michael Jordan and um
00:14:29
Kobe Bryant for pretty much you know the most significant parts of their career yeah I think I've listened to that epod
00:14:35
yeah yeah amazing biger basketball fan yeah yeah yeah he's it was incredible and one of the things you said to me earlier was that everyone has their dark
00:14:42
side and then which is often from their early experiences and all those kinds of
00:14:48
things and then it's often our light side is often created by our dark side in many respects yeah so I see shades of
00:14:55
what I would guess was your dark side in in those early years of of your um story but when you say that your dark side
00:15:01
probably came from your father what are you referring to so I kind of feel like
00:15:08
um that I have friends in the industry right who have had like quite awesome
00:15:13
childhoods and you know and and to me sometimes in their work they come across
00:15:20
as very vanilla and and then I was thinking about I go why aren't they as
00:15:25
interesting or something and they're great and they're talented but it's not as interesting and I normally when I you
00:15:31
chat to them you find out oh they have two loving parents and they had a great childhood um and so for me I think why I
00:15:39
have certain parts of my personality and like to do comedy and stuff is because I have this I have a lightness which
00:15:46
definitely comes from my mom and my mom's side of the family that are all like that and then on my dad's side it's
00:15:52
just like dodginess everywhere and like like I don't you know alcoholism and
00:16:00
like addictions and um and and just also a mentality of just I don't know how to
00:16:08
explain it best apart from saying it's a bit dodgy but in a way and then sometimes when uh I mean I don't suffer
00:16:16
from like actual depression or whatever but then sometimes if you're feeling
00:16:21
like you're a you know uh sometimes I it's feels like a mafia sensation when
00:16:27
you're like oh I want to get revenge on those people or something you know uh
00:16:33
I'm like shocked of where these feelings come from and they're normally from the Dark Side um but if I didn't have that I
00:16:43
don't think I'd be as interesting as a as a person or as a performer um and I
00:16:48
definitely like have sometimes have an edginess to jokes and stuff which I guess I wouldn't have had if I if I
00:16:56
didn't have you know one side of the family be be a bit dodgy um and the
00:17:02
other side be light so I knew I knew the difference and I knew I kind of had both
00:17:08
you embody both and that's quite interesting yeah when someone can present us both at the same time a little bit sadistic as well
00:17:14
but in the in the in the cover of your book it says um that you're always questioning am I good enough I can
00:17:21
relate for many reasons of my own to do with like coming here when I was do you think Steven that's why you're successful because you're asking
00:17:28
yourself that question I think it's intrinsically linked to why I was apparently so driven
00:17:35
MH yeah which I I've come to I've come to ask myself in recent years am I actually driven or am I being dragged by something they both look the same yeah
00:17:43
but when you're dragged it's more it's there's it's there's less control yeah less ability to stop and slow down and
00:17:50
are you workoholic I read that the P definitely so I think maybe you're also in the dragged category to some degree
00:17:55
and my dragging came from being not enough in the context I was you only black kid poorest family in the area so
00:18:03
you're there's a deep sort of sense of Shame and insecurity that you're trying to fill prove to others and yourself
00:18:08
that you're you're not my question was about when that started in you what made you can you look back and find out what
00:18:14
made you feel like you weren enough I think I definitely get self-esteem and self-worth from
00:18:21
achievements um and so when it was in school it would be getting 100% in every
00:18:26
exam and that would be good if I didn't I'd feel bad about myself and then I
00:18:32
don't know just generally being successful in things gives me makes me feel good about myself but then I was
00:18:38
thinking about one of the reasons why I had uh issues with food and because I
00:18:44
had low self-worth and and then I felt like I was not good enough I was like trash and that's why I would trash my
00:18:50
body cuz I just felt like well I don't deserve anything different and then that's a really complicated question to
00:18:57
work out why don't I feel good enough um and and I've thought about of a lot and
00:19:05
and some things I know but then some things I think I I don't know why some things are as simple as like for example
00:19:12
being born a girl in the area where I was from and boys were more praised like
00:19:17
even at the dog shows did something called Junior handling and then if a boy ever entered
00:19:24
he'd normally win cuz it was like oh boy doing it uh whereas girls just just weren't
00:19:29
seen as being as good um the boys school I went to an all girls high school but
00:19:35
the boys school next door was seen as more prestigious and better um and um
00:19:42
and they had the multi-million dollar theater at their school and you know it was just
00:19:47
um and so I think some of it is just as simple as like being born a girl in in
00:19:52
the area and I was like God that's so dumb though why didn't I um like
00:19:57
transcend that and then some of it must have been from
00:20:03
not feeling love although obviously I know my parents love me very very much
00:20:09
but um because of I came from a very conservative family we didn't really talk about emotions and feelings and so
00:20:17
it wasn't expressed in the way that I probably needed it to so I I didn't feel
00:20:23
good enough unless I was getting first in my grade in a subject or something
00:20:28
and then and then I was congratulated and so then I felt good um or winning a
00:20:34
prize or a trophy and and that's when you would get the praise from the people you came about yeah and so I just kind
00:20:40
of went with that um uh but it's just but then it's like I like there was
00:20:47
nothing wrong with me I go why did I not feel good enough but I guess I've always felt that
00:20:55
um and it's kind of sad when you think about it cuz you're like why would somebody it's not like I did anything
00:21:02
bad or you know should have felt ashamed about something I just always felt like
00:21:07
that I guess it proves that kids they don't they're not born with perfect
00:21:12
self-esteem they do need that to be fostered and poured into and nourished
00:21:18
or else there can be an ABS so what I'm saying is there doesn't have to be something that happened that proved you weren't good enough but there could just
00:21:23
be maybe something that didn't happen that proved you were and I think there's all these little micro things that can
00:21:30
happen um you know you're not chosen for something or you're not uh you're always
00:21:36
at the back at the side or you know you're not ever the star or just all these little things or no one ever
00:21:42
thought you'd make it or be anything MH um and just like little things that
00:21:47
little comments people would say or something and then um yeah and then that all just adds up and you you're 13 14
00:21:55
you're in school you're shy this point I'm guessing you you have that struggle with feeling like you're good enough I
00:22:00
think that's maybe a symptom of the shyness yeah and also like I was just
00:22:05
very average looking I had like a snaggle tooth what's a snagle tooth it's like a basically a deformity like a
00:22:12
deformed tooth like on one side which I've had fix now but kind of like a Fang
00:22:17
I guess but only on one side so it wasn't like some cool vampire thing I um
00:22:23
and then I had that and I was so painfully shy where I'd go red in the
00:22:28
face if a teacher asked me to answer a question in class even though I knew the answer it was just it was so
00:22:35
embarrassing and I didn't have any friends um and I guess because I thought why would people want to be friends with
00:22:41
me I'm not good-looking or popular or cool in any way and and so I just yeah
00:22:48
it was it was really that was like one of the darkest times like when I like 13
00:22:53
14 and and like you know people are kind of becoming the M themselves at that
00:22:59
point and then I read this article in the library that said that what your personality is at 15 will be your
00:23:06
personality for Life uh because I used to eat my lunches in the library just by myself so I was reading stuff all the
00:23:12
time and then I read this and I went like I'm so close to 15 if I don't change this is going to be me forever
00:23:19
and can I imagine my life like not expressing anything to anybody just like
00:23:25
being just shy and introverted and isol at ated and I just knew I didn't want
00:23:31
that that that wouldn't have been the happy life for me and not that there's anything wrong with being shy like the
00:23:36
sh sometimes can be like a superpower You observe people and you um you know
00:23:42
you learn a lot by by observing but then I just was like no I
00:23:47
want to have friends and I want to have fun and be popular and and so I was like
00:23:52
oh well I better get a move on and luckily I found those motivational tapes and then and then they helped me um
00:24:01
because I thought I want to be somebody that expresses myself like literally you'd look at me uh and I sometimes see
00:24:08
it in my niece now I think she has a similar thing like it's almost like you wouldn't be able to register anything that's going on you wouldn't know if I'd
00:24:14
had a good day or a bad day I just it just be like no no expression or
00:24:20
anything um and then I I was like okay I'm going to force myself to like come
00:24:26
out of my little cocoon or my shell or um whatever the metaphor is and just
00:24:32
break out and with the help of those tapes and like it having a strategy and how to do it what was the strategy uh
00:24:39
well there were all sorts of things but I remember from that how to win friends and influence people there was something
00:24:45
about talking to five new people every day and so that was one of the first things I did and like talking to girls
00:24:51
on the bus or just you know walking up through the school Gates and talking just talking to the person next to me
00:24:57
and saying high and what you realize is that there's other people as lonely and as isolated as what you are and that
00:25:05
might have been the highlight of their day to speak to somebody new and you know instead of just sitting in the
00:25:11
library all day waiting for friends to find me which they never would why don't I actively go out and join like SP other
00:25:19
sport teams or other clubs at the school and like actively try to make friends
00:25:25
like it's not just going to happen if you're just doing nothing um so there were these little tips and
00:25:32
strategies um but one of which was to get attention which was to be essentially to
00:25:39
be naughty to get attention it's kind of like that uh you know Eminem the rapper
00:25:45
if he hadn't put out all these songs that were like really controversial and had you know outrageous things in them
00:25:52
would he have been a successful rapper probably not and so it was kind of like
00:25:57
I then to do some dodgy things at school to get known to get like a reputation
00:26:03
which was against my natural personality cuz I was such a good little girl um but
00:26:08
I had to do things outrageous things to get attention and then that led to
00:26:15
popularity then once you have the popularity you don't need to do that stuff but yeah is there some kind of a
00:26:22
link there between you the career you would then pursue as an actress as a
00:26:27
performer um a comedian all of those things and this sort of early desire to have
00:26:34
attention and validation from you know your PE I think it started from just
00:26:41
like a more normal thing about wanting to have friends M and wanting to be invited to some parties and um so it it
00:26:49
started it started from that and and like and then you wanted to be respected but then to be respected people first
00:26:56
have to know who you are and so sometimes you have to do that attention-seeking behavior to get that
00:27:03
um but but the how I got into like
00:27:08
acting was really well my mom dragged me into it because um I mean the studies on
00:27:15
that creative arts can really help your self-esteem and self-confidence it's like insane like it's really good for
00:27:21
young people who are struggling and my mom could see me like struggling and
00:27:26
having no friends and so mom takes me to these drama classes at this community center and literally has to drag me out
00:27:33
of the car I'm holding on to the car door with my fingernails like going no no no I don't want to go it was so
00:27:39
traumatic but she was doing it not because she wanted me to become an actor like we don't have any professional
00:27:45
entertainers in the family like you know uh nobody I know was in the business or whatever at that point it was more to
00:27:52
help my self-confidence and self-esteem through the creative arts
00:27:58
and weirdly it really did because when you're shy like I was to play different
00:28:05
characters it's like an escape because it's not really me it's a different character and and then you can perform
00:28:12
as that person and then eventually some of that confidence starts coming to you the real you um uh from from doing that
00:28:21
but obviously at the time nobody thought I would become a professional actress or they would have laughed about that
00:28:28
scenario it's it's interesting because you can see these different drives forming within you you've got this drive
00:28:33
for um I don't know you might say for validation externally but then because
00:28:39
you come from a family that didn't have money there's also where you were rewarded for academic success or being
00:28:46
successful at something there's also this drive to be successful which shows up in early in your story when you start selling things and buying things and
00:28:52
then you do exceptionally well in school um you go off to board boarding school it's what a 16 years old I think in part
00:28:58
it sounds like to escape from the childhood the household dynamics of your father and your mother yeah um you do
00:29:05
exceptionally well there as well exceptionally well and then you end up in Africa South Africa I know which
00:29:14
is random uh so you know a lot of people do the Gap here thing and I mean it's
00:29:21
random but basically as a witness in a major crime Squad investigation when I was in my final year of school i'
00:29:28
witnessed something and had to testify and then uh through that some people
00:29:34
were very impressed with my ability to go and do that in a case and so I was
00:29:40
like and and they told me about this program that was uh it's a rotary program and it was called a youth
00:29:46
Ambassador um program and basically they wanted young people who were very good
00:29:51
at public speaking and by this point I'd done I'd forced myself to do debating and public speaking and to get over my
00:29:58
shyness and so I was quite a good speaker and and I got recommended into
00:30:05
this program and got selected and you don't get to choose what country you go to they they just select for you so and
00:30:13
they sent one boy and one girl from our district over um to different countries and I got given South Africa and I was
00:30:20
like Co cuz I thought it was going to be like The Lion King at first which was one of my favorite movies and then I go
00:30:26
rock up to South Africa a few years post apartheid and it was so different to
00:30:33
Australia like Australia's very safe Johannesburg had the highest rape and
00:30:38
murder rate in the world at that time and there were guns everywhere and bobbed wir fences and you know attack
00:30:46
dogs and it was like it was so eye openening but then to
00:30:52
also uh be constantly aware of the violence and like I had to carry a little like a wooden baton like what you
00:31:00
see like an old you know policeman in a cartoon would would carry because I literally if somebody attack me I'd have
00:31:06
to hit them on the head with it and it was like I was like this is crazy like there was there was so much going on
00:31:13
that year um and but that's how I got the malaria uh which forced me to have
00:31:21
this Vision that I was to become an actress and I think if I'd never ever
00:31:26
gone to Africa I never would have had that life-changing vision and I probably
00:31:31
just would have gone back to law school and and being being a lawyer in in
00:31:37
Australia me and you both share that in common we both were in Africa and got bitten by mosquito you have a vision I
00:31:43
had a vision what was your vision so I my dad was holding so we're in our house and they didn't know that I had malaria
00:31:49
this is what my dad and my mom tell me I was very young they were holding me here and I was I'd woken up in the night because I said there was a man by my bed
00:31:55
so they' picked me up thinking oh my God there's this man in his bedroom and that when my dad was holding me like this so
00:32:02
I can see over his shoulder the man would be behind him and I was freaking out that there's a man behind him um
00:32:08
which I was later would call the shadow man and wrote a little novel about when I was about 14 and this this shadow man
00:32:14
um because I was losing my mind they took me to a hospital and at hospital they found out that I had malaria but in hindsight they tell the story that
00:32:20
that's that man saved my life oh you know what I mean so I grew up very I grew up with this idea that I had a
00:32:26
guardian angel the shadow man but it was just malaran hallucinations yeah well like tell about
00:32:32
your hallucinations I had a n nasty strain of malaria and um it was put in
00:32:38
hospital and you know malaria is so diff I don't know whether you remember because how old you but it's it felt
00:32:44
like just felt like I was not in my body and and then they take me into hospital and give me these drugs and then I then
00:32:50
I just started hallucinating and I hallucinated that I was an actress that I was so good that I win an Academy
00:32:56
Award and I must have I mean I'd seen the Oscars on TV I'd obviously never been and um and then I just walked down
00:33:03
the and it was so real like I could see all the people with the dresses and I get up on stage and then I give an
00:33:09
acceptance rap rather than an acceptance speech because I thought oh yeah that's hardcore and at one point I had want I
00:33:16
had wanted to be a rapper because of their coolness and Swagger um didn't
00:33:21
work out for me Lu but my little rap group with my sister yeah didn't work out but
00:33:28
and it was so vivid and real like I could like I can still remember
00:33:34
it and then I came out of hospital I was in hospital for two weeks I came out and I was like I think I've got to become an
00:33:41
actress now i' had this vision and people go a no like the malaria has
00:33:47
affected your brain they they're just like they thought I was nuts like they thought I was crazy and I go no I've
00:33:54
seen it and they're like no no no like you've you've got into the best law school in Australia like maybe go to law
00:34:00
school and have a great career and I'm like no I've seen it and I and I think I
00:34:06
need to be an actress now and then I left South Africa a month earlier I was supposed to be there a full 12 months I
00:34:12
left one month earlier uh to audition for a drama school in Australia which I got rejected because obviously I was
00:34:18
terrible um and and nobody looked at me and go actress nobody so
00:34:25
um yeah and and it still took I think from that Vision five years until I really got it
00:34:34
you could make money from acting H but I it was like the vision came to me and I
00:34:40
watched a lot of Oprah and Oprah was like well the universe will tell you like first it'll come in little Whispers
00:34:46
And then it'll be like bricks falling on you and I was like but see I've I've had the vision I have to I have to do acting
00:34:53
now um in hindsight yeah was that a malaria hallucination or was it divine
00:35:02
intervention I don't know I think is was that some subconscious desire that I was
00:35:08
never brave enough to say to anybody um because I was in the high
00:35:13
school musicals and plays um you know in the musical I was like never cast as the
00:35:19
lead or whatever but I really enjoyed it like I I really did enjoy it and so but
00:35:25
I just never thought someone like me could have a career in that area so I was like was that just a subconscious desire that just decided to come out
00:35:32
when I was deathly ill or was it some kind of I don't know some higher power
00:35:38
or something showing me that this was more my purpose um cuz I remember a lot
00:35:44
thinking that time like what is my purpose like what am I supposed to be doing in the world and I'd write in my little diary you know like but again I
00:35:52
watched a lot of Oprah so I was like you know what's my purpose how can I give back to people those tapes as well yeah
00:35:59
probably so you go back to Australia you pursue law I guess for the money you just thought that was a good well
00:36:05
because my father had dropped out okay I definitely wanted to have a college degree and he always said that was his
00:36:12
biggest regret that he never got his business degree and because i' got I was
00:36:17
so hard to get into this law school you almost had to be near perfect in all your exams so I just thought I may as
00:36:24
well just do it as well will you ever trying to impress either one of them more than the other oh my mom just
00:36:29
wanted her dream for me was to be normal I guess like you know to have friends to
00:36:35
kind of have a you know relationship and be kind of normal so it's not like she definitely didn't want me to be some
00:36:41
kind of a known public person sometimes the oldest sibling you're the oldest of
00:36:46
four right is a bit of a reflection of more so of a reflection I think of what the parents wanted for themselves I tend
00:36:53
to think that's a bit of a so I'm wondering if your like desire for success and valid if it was something that you felt from your father like you
00:36:59
know him he couldn't be that himself so maybe he reflected that more praise on you when you were objectively successful
00:37:07
in the things that you did um why would you want to be a lawyer is yeah I just
00:37:13
because if you were smart you'd go into Laural medicine um and and so you know
00:37:19
and they would have loved to have gone around and said you know oh my daughter's a lawyer at this firm and
00:37:24
that would have been a great you know great career that they would have thought that my parents had to work
00:37:29
really hard to send me to the school that I did like at one point apart from selling all the dog products my dad was
00:37:35
also working at the gas station overnight and you know just to afford my school uniforms and stuff like that so
00:37:43
so for them a successful outcome would have been okay she got into the top law school and now she's going to be a
00:37:48
lawyer and therefore all that money spent on education was worth it and you
00:37:53
go back you do end up qualifying as a lawyer yeah um you become a lawyer it did take me 10 years though it's
00:37:59
normally a 5year double degree and I did Arts as well um why did it take so long cuz you're acting so basically yeah so I
00:38:06
would I'd be in theater shows at first and then it would be TV shows and my law school had an 80% attendance rule so
00:38:13
basically if I started in a semester and then for some reason my filming schedule
00:38:19
or whatever I'd have to repeat the subject because if I didn't attend in person 80% of the time so it was
00:38:26
exhausting um often I was would fly have to fly into State I'd be filming in
00:38:31
another state I have to get up at 4:00 a.m. in the morning and fly to Sydney to law school and then fly all the way back
00:38:38
that night from the from the first time you did whatever you class as like an acting gig or tried to be an actress to
00:38:46
the moment when you feel like you had made it how many years is that so I
00:38:51
started quite late I guess I started like 18 turning 19 which is quite late I
00:38:57
think I think a lot of people start kids yeah 12 13 I guess um and then that was
00:39:03
like proper acting classes like proper like with people wanting to do it as a
00:39:08
career and then I had I wrote my first play at 21 I just wrote it in two nights
00:39:14
and then it won this playwriting competition and got put on um and I was like holy crap um and then a television
00:39:22
station gave me $90,000 to put it on professionally which was like kind of insane
00:39:27
great luck for the first thing I'd ever written um and I realized from that
00:39:33
point nobody saw me as an actor I wasn't like Nicole Kidman or that you know in
00:39:39
that vein so I realized pretty quick I had to write myself my own material if I
00:39:44
was going to make it but I didn't start earning a professional like a full-time
00:39:49
wage um until I was a regular on a TV show at 23 at what point in this journey towards
00:39:56
being an act do you realize that your weight is influencing how people see you
00:40:04
and the way that they're casting you so when I was like uh about 21 into like
00:40:12
22 uh I had something called PCOS polycystic aarian syndrome and one of
00:40:17
the key signifiers of that was like rapid weight gain so all of a sudden I
00:40:24
mean when I first started acting I was just a regular side was a bit athletic looking but you know pretty regular um
00:40:32
and and then all of a sudden I gained 30 kilos and was like and I had some other
00:40:37
symptoms as well I had like some dark hair on my arms and there there's a couple of key signifiers to it and then
00:40:44
I went to the doctors and they said oh yeah you've got PCOS and in that first play that I'd written when I was 21 I'd
00:40:51
cast a girl who was bigger than you know quite a large girl and then I noticed on
00:40:56
stage like did get way more laughs than me and I kind of wrote all the roles quite evenly and I was like why is that
00:41:04
girl getting getting more laughs and I honestly thought I mean one she's
00:41:09
hilarious but it's cuz she's bigger and people like laughing at bigger people
00:41:14
and then there I did this subject at University called comedy and power and
00:41:21
basically you know there is a science to if you normally if you want to sleep with somebody you're not nor wanting to
00:41:28
laugh at them so you know if you want to sleep with someone you're into them
00:41:33
attracted to them but normally the people that you want to laugh at are people that have some kind of immediate
00:41:39
physical irregularity like you know bigger women do do well in comedy um you
00:41:46
might be really tall really short you might have a really big nose something something about you that's quite
00:41:52
distinctive um that people can instantly go aha you know and they in more in
00:41:57
comedy the science of it is more people want to be your friend rather than they don't want to be your lover they they want to be your friend and they think
00:42:04
you know you'd be good to hang out with and have a laugh with and so it was really interesting when I gained all
00:42:11
this weight I was like ah I think I'm going to lean into comedy because um
00:42:18
even though I tried to be a serious actress at first I was like hang on this
00:42:23
which could be seen as a huge negative a lot of people would be going oh no you know I put on all this weight instead I
00:42:30
went the opposite way and was like you know what I could use this to my advantage I like comedy I I I think I
00:42:37
should go into comedy and use being bigger as just what you know a good tool
00:42:42
in my comedy toolbox and then that was kind of reinforced I guess because then you people laugh harder and then they
00:42:47
pay you more and and it is true it is is true people like laughed laughed more
00:42:53
and I lent into comedy and then I got a scholarship from Nicole Kidman uh to go to New York and I went to a
00:43:00
second City Comedy School in New York at the time um and yeah and then I just
00:43:07
realized I had a quite a good knack for it and that was taking off more than the dramatic acting how did you feel about
00:43:13
yourself at that time well I guess uh I was quite shocked in
00:43:21
my Diaries when I looked back at them for research for the book even when I was 16 and I wasn't big at all I was
00:43:27
very athletic played lots of different sports and and my first goal was like to lose two kilos I guess cuz my mom had
00:43:36
made a comment at some point not not for any bad reasons she just you know
00:43:42
thought she had weight issues herself and just thought you know if I lost those two kilos I might feel better in
00:43:48
myself or something like that and so I just when I gained all that weight there
00:43:55
there's kind of a dichotomy cuz at one point I'm like this could help me professionally in comedy and you know
00:44:02
big girls do do better in comedy I can see a pigeon hole for myself in that
00:44:08
area and you can be successful and I'd just gotten on a television show when I was 23 playing kind of the I guess the
00:44:15
whale character is what they sometimes refer to me as and they refer to you as the whale character yeah well like I was
00:44:21
the obese girlfriend of one of the guys who he was embarrassed to go out with me
00:44:28
so the whole joke was like he was trying to hide me because he didn't want people to know I was in a relationship cuz I
00:44:34
was obese and that was the whole it was very popular show in Australia it's called fat pizza and and so on the one
00:44:42
hand there's that but then on the other hand I felt
00:44:49
like I knew I was eating very badly I mean my diet at that point was just
00:44:55
carbs pretty much I remember coming to New York and going to Comedy school and you know just eating a pint of ice cream
00:45:01
for dinner or a whole big bag of chips or something and and then and I so on
00:45:07
the one hand I could be confident and know that this could be good for me careerwise but on the other hand I
00:45:14
knew I'm not treating myself right this is not good you know I'm not being
00:45:21
healthy um and so I had both going on in my mind at the same time how do you play
00:45:27
a role in a movie that fat Pizza movie where you're basically
00:45:34
a someone something's somebody that somebody else is embarrassed about and how does that not impact your
00:45:41
self-esteem at some level cuz I'm thinking if I was playing in a movie someone an individual that someone was trying to hide the thing is like cuz
00:45:48
when it's acting it's not quite you and only on a rare occasion would people
00:45:56
confuse like cuz obviously the guys on the show were pretty great and respectful off off
00:46:01
camera and everything um it was that was just the character I was playing and I was lucky to be on a comedy show and uh
00:46:09
to be earning money that way but then I remember going to a post office and just like mailing a letter and the guy was
00:46:16
obviously a fan of the show and started saying oh Tula that was my character oh he's so fun you know and like he in real
00:46:24
life was saying stuff like the guy on the show but this is now real life yeah
00:46:29
yeah yeah and it was very hurtful in in real life whereas for acting it's you know kind of can separate it a little
00:46:36
bit what did you say to him that day that post post office I didn't say anything I just kind of walked out and
00:46:41
thought Oh that guy's an idiot he doesn't understand the distinction between a comedy show and you know a
00:46:48
real person and and so that was just a bit hurtful um but it but I guess it
00:46:55
must but then on the other hand it it's hard to feel sorry for myself because then
00:47:03
obviously not in Australia but then when I came to America and played like Fat Amy which is probably my most famous character I
00:47:11
mean now I'm making millions of dollars from playing the the fat funny girl and really leaning into that and
00:47:18
so and what do you care about more than millions of dollars or the you know what I mean and that's well now I care about
00:47:25
my health and wellbeing but but back then I guess I thought oh well I'm
00:47:30
becoming successful and this is helping me become successful I think this is really at the heart of what your book
00:47:37
takes on is the idea that you know we can become quote
00:47:42
unquote successful in the eyes of the world but
00:47:47
that doesn't necessarily mean we're successful holistically in all the things that we need to to be successful
00:47:54
and I I I relate to that so much because because of the things we've described about being driven and dragged and all that stuff I think I became successful
00:48:01
in one of maybe the 10 things that I needed to be to be like rounded as a person yeah and anomalies like you that
00:48:08
achieve such great success often there's a trade-off yeah so I felt like I needed
00:48:14
like Olympic Athlete dedication to make it in the entertainment business I mean the odds of making it are so small one
00:48:21
to make it in my home country and then to come to Hollywood and to make it um the odds are you know Millions to one
00:48:28
really of having the career that I've had um so you know like an Olympic
00:48:33
gymnast if you meet people and they're like incredible at gymnastics but then you talk to them um
00:48:42
about their personal life or their their skills and uh and then
00:48:49
basically you can tell they're like stunted I guess is the is the right word um so they've had this drive and this
00:48:55
focus and they've achieved and they if you're an athlete you know like get to the Olympics or or to me like being in
00:49:03
an Oscar nominated movie um I haven't won obviously the vision hasn't come true um but but was I stunted I was like
00:49:12
if you really knew me you'd know that yeah I hadn't been on out on a date um
00:49:18
until my early 30s I hadn't had that in Intimate experiences
00:49:23
and uh and relationships and so all that area of my life like wasn't great but I
00:49:31
was like the most successful person to ever come out of my high school or you know so like there were great things I
00:49:38
could go courtside at the LA Lakers games or you know like they awesome stuff but then there was
00:49:46
like yeah on a personal side I wasn't the the best person and then I then I
00:49:52
knew that I knew oh God okay so I've excelled in one area but now there's
00:49:58
others that I'm like quite lacking in and the other area was apart from love
00:50:03
life and kind of social life was also um Health you have you move to America um
00:50:10
you get um you work very hard for the next couple of years you get this you know this opportunity in bridesmaid
00:50:16
which then takes some time for it to come out I read in your book that you got paid $3,500 for your role in
00:50:23
bridesmaid which is quite shocking um yeah that my first job in America and I
00:50:29
mean I was very lucky to to get it I mean what an awesome cracker over a movie to get that but to be paid that
00:50:36
little and basically that $3,500 I then had to pay to the union to join the union so I basically I made no money I
00:50:42
lost money because I had to pay to go to the premere like to buy my dress and everything so I lost money doing
00:50:48
bridesmaids but and then you have to wait it normally takes a whole year when you film a movie for the movie to be
00:50:54
released so that was a really skint year where I was living on $60 a week in La
00:50:59
once I'd paid my rent and my car hire and that's not a lot of money so like I
00:51:05
wasn't partying or living living this life it was
00:51:10
basically just having that Focus trying to write for myself like going to auditions and um and I had to wait a
00:51:17
whole year till bridesmaids came out and then suddenly it comes out there this big hit and I book six movies off the
00:51:23
back of it one of which was Pitch Perfect uh which was kind of my real golden ticket um that movie and became
00:51:30
the highest grossing musical comedy franchise of all time yes and there was very very very successful and very very
00:51:37
awesome fun movies to be a part of so they're they're like such a gift those movies your life changes at that point
00:51:44
because you you're sort of globally internationally famous now and surely
00:51:50
that means job done we can we can chill we can go look at other things and I say this because there so many people me
00:51:56
being probably one of them that maybe told ourselves in the past that once we hit the Pitch Perfect the global Smash
00:52:02
Hit success then we'll chill then you'll be happy and then it'll be fine and then
00:52:07
uh but then of course then you come up with some different goals that I'm like is even harder you guys may have heard
00:52:14
our most recent news the launch of flight Studio which is our brand new podcast and media technology company as
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00:53:11
pivotal moment and turning point in your life is clearly when you went to that doctor that day after deciding that you
00:53:17
wanted to have a child mhm yeah why did
00:53:22
you decide you wanted to have a child was there an influence something you'd seen or something I yes I never thought cuz I was so career driven I thought uh
00:53:30
you know I'd never thought I would want to have a family um and also being in my business it was so so egocentric the
00:53:37
business um and so I just didn't think that was in the cards for me and I also thought oh well I'm probably never going
00:53:44
to find a partner or whatever and then it was just like this biological clock
00:53:49
inside me when in my late 30s just started like ticking really loudly and I kind of say it's like imp Peter Pan and
00:53:56
that crocodile that has the clock inside it it was just like like you could hear it going tick tick tick I was like do it
00:54:02
now like it'll otherwise it'll be too late and I would see babies on the street with their moms and be like a and
00:54:09
I just like keep staring at all the babies and and just like like I just really felt this urge in inside me to be
00:54:17
a mother and even though I didn't have a partner at that point and I just was
00:54:23
like uh I think I should uh try and and but I was getting I was like 39
00:54:29
years old and I didn't even know that I had eggs or what could be done and um
00:54:35
and then I went to the fertility doctor and and by this point like I'm living this really large like you know I am
00:54:43
medically obese but I'm living this kind of amazing life I traveled the world I
00:54:49
learned how to have fun and uh not be so much of a workaholic and I was like you
00:54:54
know like that lizo song like it's bad o' like that was like my life like I'm walking around just loving it I've
00:55:02
been successful now and then the doctor looks me up and down and goes yeah but you're not healthy and he
00:55:10
said you have a much better chance of having a baby if you were healthy and the way he said it with like kind of
00:55:17
quite a lot of disdain in his voice I was like huh cuz that's that was a
00:55:23
stranger most people you know in Hollywood they're not going to come up to you and go oh you're engaging in bad
00:55:31
you know eating habits obviously like um they're just like oh congratulations on your new movie and yay it's great um you
00:55:38
play Fat Amy and that's awesome and how successful it's been uh I don't think so
00:55:44
he wasn't in my demographic he looked a bit like the doctor from Doc from um Back to the
00:55:52
Future okay yeah older guy with white wiry hair so yeah I don't think he was
00:55:57
in the pit perfect fan base and he just he just said it straight to my face and
00:56:02
then I go oh I'm not healthy cuz and I knew deep down I just suppressed those
00:56:08
feelings but I knew deep down I wasn't healthy but I didn't have any serious diseases I was doing incredible things
00:56:16
all around the world so I just didn't and then he said that and it like it really sunk in it was like this
00:56:22
criticism that was I couldn't ignore and I is like oh God okay yeah he is right
00:56:30
and I'm not healthy um because on the one hand I'm like a beacon of body
00:56:36
positivity and that CU I really do think beauty is at any size and um and and had
00:56:43
and had grown you know so much self-confidence um by that point but then on the other hand I knew I was
00:56:50
engaging in unhealthy eating behaviors and that was something I wanted to improve in myself and then I I thought
00:56:56
well the next year 2020 I'll make the whole year about getting healthy like I
00:57:01
said I'm not going to work weirdly I couldn't have predicted that a pandemic was going to happen uh I'd already
00:57:07
planned not to work that year and to take a whole year to do Health stuff you
00:57:13
you get back in the car after that doctor visit and you describe kind of your what's going on in your brain but
00:57:18
you you've as you said you know at that point you knew you weren't healthy deep down deep down yeah um every one kind of
00:57:26
knows you know if you if you are medically obese you kind of know that yeah but to get from there to taking any
00:57:35
action it's really hard to to change behavior in such a way yes especially because I yes had I tried to go on diets
00:57:43
before had I gone on diets had I gone to like a little health farm and you know lost 5 seven pounds in a week and and
00:57:51
then you never sustain it and then it goes back up so I'd like it's not like never tried I just never thought because
00:57:59
always the weight would come back on and that was just my homeostasis or whatever from my body was like at 102 kilos and
00:58:07
that's kind of just how it was and I was like oh well I could never permanently
00:58:13
change that I just thought no I can get two degrees from University and become
00:58:18
an international movie star but I just can't like with the weight I was like I can't like just you know I don't know
00:58:26
I'm just not right in that area I never I'll never be healthy in that way and that one comment from that
00:58:34
stranger yeah it was something in the way he said it I was like sugar I'm not
00:58:40
like I'm not healthy like and that must be what a lot of
00:58:46
people thought they just never said it to my face um and then it was kind of
00:58:52
the motivation almost not really for myself and my health but for a future
00:58:59
child that I thought well now I've got to fix this um and work really hard um
00:59:05
to do it because if I I I tried so many time I don't know 20 times or whatever
00:59:10
in the past to but it always only lasted a short term and then I was like well
00:59:16
okay but this is different cuz now the motivation is to have a child so that's like a different motivating factor you
00:59:24
want to have a child this doctor says you'll have a a chance if you're healthy you leave there that day you must also
00:59:29
have it in the back of your mind that people are paying you millions and millions and millions of dollars I think around that time that year You' made
00:59:35
like $20 million in movies or whatever um they're paying you because you fit this
00:59:40
Persona that they want yeah so as soon as I started telling people in my team
00:59:45
about this they're like oh no no no why would you want to lose weight like that no I wouldn't if I was you I wouldn't do
00:59:52
that cuz then you lose your multi-million dollar pigeon hole that you've so so successfully created and
00:59:57
look at all the work you've done to get that and now you're just going to throw it away so I was then literally like okay
01:00:06
what do I do with my life am I get healthy but I lose my career or do I
01:00:13
just stay the way I am and maybe never have a child and like that was literally kind
01:00:18
of how it was positioned to me and so even though literally everyone around me
01:00:25
pretty much said as you are I just felt like nah I got to I think I know deep
01:00:32
down that I'm engaging in unhealthy behaviors and I'm going to I'm going to work on my health and try to have a
01:00:39
child thinking at that point I know it sounds simplistic but thinking that my career could be over
01:00:45
then but I was like no it's too that's too
01:00:50
important going on that Journey losing the weight and all those kinds of things is never a straight line yeah know it's
01:00:56
it was the I mean the pandemic helped a lot cuz literally everything stopped um
01:01:03
and and I could just focus focus on being healthy was that became a big
01:01:09
blessing um to me and when I really focused and did the emotional work
01:01:16
because there's things like that I write about in the book that I just never thought about until I started
01:01:22
emotionally processing things did one of your contract say I think it was Pitch Perfect say that you couldn't lose 10B
01:01:30
of weight contractually yeah so that's like quite common you can't drastically change your appearance so that's pretty
01:01:35
much in all acting contracts um it's not just about weight it's about your hair
01:01:41
you know what you look like um and you can't go you know too much either side
01:01:48
um that's basically because sometimes in films you have to do re- shoots or sometimes you know they might want to do
01:01:54
a sequel or something and so you kind of have to stay the same so literally like I have to ask somebody if I'd want to
01:02:00
cut my hair right now uh to a different color or style or whatever it's just
01:02:06
it's just a thing in the business because you could be asked to do a re-shoot on a film a year later you have
01:02:12
to kind of look the same so this journey of losing weight tell me about this process what
01:02:18
helped you so I was like as you can probably tell like I'm quite goal orientated and uh and so I was like okay
01:02:25
2020 is be my year of health I'm themed it I'm going to put it on Instagram so I'm like held responsible yeah H you
01:02:32
know the other times it would be a bit more private like okay I'm going to go to this health farm or whatever and I'm
01:02:37
like okay it's going to be my year of health and I'm just going to focus on being healthy and um the the thing Anne
01:02:45
haway introduced me to this doctor who was um great cuz I guess she saw me on a
01:02:50
film we did together called the hustle and she kind of saw me struggling and his specialty was kind of dwelling into
01:02:58
emotional emotions and how they can affect your physical health and I never even thought about that like I just
01:03:04
thought you know going on a diet is about eating less and exercising more and um I just never thought but to me
01:03:13
because I was an emotional eater really the kicker was to process emotions and
01:03:18
to learn how to process emotions and obviously from my family environment I had definitely not learned um any skills
01:03:26
in that area and was kind of holding on to everything like a so like a bag of
01:03:31
groceries of this little trauma and this and and they are holding on to it m um
01:03:37
and so I had to start processing that um with the doctor like we did a phone call
01:03:43
every two weeks and and at first it's awful you're like oh my God what do I talk you know and talk about my personal
01:03:50
things and it felt awful to do it at first um and then I did it and
01:03:56
then gradually it kind of I started processing things and then I could
01:04:02
release them the emotions and and then and then the weight loss kind of came
01:04:08
but because I wasn't working I I did do crazy workouts like I was working out like 2 hours 2 and 1 half hours a day um
01:04:17
to help you know to help accelerated I was cooking my own meals I was you know
01:04:22
concentrating on eating high protein meals and like I was just doing all the right things because I didn't have any
01:04:28
stress of work and um and I was just like okay this is going to be it but the
01:04:34
real thing was the emotional what what are those bags that you let go of emotionally I think a lot of it like I
01:04:42
don't think I would have been able to write this book if I hadn't have done that uh emotional work with the doctor
01:04:47
because um there was just stuff that I suppressed you know a lot of stuff about
01:04:52
my father and my complicated relationship with him and and the sadness of him dying um uh he suddenly
01:05:00
had a heart attack and and died right you know close after Pitch Perfect one came out um and I think just all these
01:05:10
little things in my childhood um that you know I just I guess I
01:05:19
never thought that that was associated with my weight but it obviously was and
01:05:24
because I hadn't processed things it was was like I was holding on to barriers it was like the weight was a barrier one
01:05:31
for like intimacy for example you know I never wanted a relationship or wanted to
01:05:37
be attractive or whatever and the weight was kind of a barrier because that kept all the people is do you believe that
01:05:43
I've heard that from psychologists a few times even on this podcast before I've heard one particular guy called Johan
01:05:49
har who wrote a book called Lost connections tell me that in a study where they looked at um women who who
01:05:55
were clinically obese and then they put them through a weight loss program they found that some of the women would then
01:06:01
re regain weight and the Catalyst for that was them being hit on they discovered in those women that there was
01:06:07
early sort of abuse or there was issues so they made this link that sometimes we
01:06:12
use weight as a defense from sort of sexual advances or and I definitely was because I wanted to be in the fat funny
01:06:18
friend role which I played quite well in real life and on screen because I didn't
01:06:25
you know I didn't want somebody to be coming home with me and then seeing how I really lived or felt you know why I
01:06:32
don't know I guess I just was embarrassed or do you remember men or
01:06:38
women hitting on you at any point in your 20s and then actively rejecting them off so I literally was like for
01:06:45
some people like um but didn't anybody come up to you whatever I was like no
01:06:50
like I honestly don't remember one person um apart from the little boyfriend I had when I was 16 which was
01:06:55
the most innocent thing ever where we just held hands and maybe kissed once but
01:07:00
anyways uh when I got famous from Pitch Perfect there was like a waiter at chat
01:07:07
Marmont that like gave me his number and like you know basically said you
01:07:12
know take me home with you tonight kind of thing and I was shocked and I was there with my buddy Matt Lucas and I was
01:07:19
like what do I do with this like it was kind of like the first attention so only
01:07:25
when I started like noticing any attention was when I became very successful so that
01:07:33
did I almost felt like I was in invisible attractiveness wise until that
01:07:39
point did you text the waiter no I didn't but Matt goes you should have what are you doing go go for it and I go
01:07:45
Matt no like I well I was so shy in that area I was like I'm not just going to
01:07:50
bring a waiter home from the chatow Marmont um we get a lot of people from prison as well when I became famous they
01:07:57
like DM you and like go oh be my wife and all this stuff like oh my God like
01:08:04
but no like I just unless I was just so blocked off to that I didn't notice
01:08:09
anything you know I when a woman in particular gets over 30 what I've heard
01:08:15
and especially considering some of my friends who are women over 30 is people around them sometimes start getting a
01:08:20
bit pushy like their friends start you know come on re come on go for him I'll
01:08:26
give him a chance yeah did you feel that sort of external pressure at all from people my father would always say oh on
01:08:32
The Limited times we talk oh are you seeing anybody i' always get so angry at
01:08:38
that question i' like why is he asking me that as if I'd want to get married
01:08:43
like him and my mom were and how terrible that was and I'd always just get angry at it and just be like no and
01:08:50
just like I don't know it just shut down about that issue is it because it came
01:08:56
from him who was yeah in particular and I was like oh God what like out of all
01:09:01
the people to say something most people didn't didn't say anything but I know
01:09:07
there is that pressure like uh for single women over 30 you just get like a
01:09:14
little bit and but I felt it more in my later 30s um and I I went on a dating app at
01:09:22
one point to like try to meet people did that go cuz I was like well I actually met some good people in real life yeah
01:09:30
it was like dating at um Rya that has some celebrities on it they would let me on it I tried when I was I tried when I
01:09:35
was 18 I didn't have anything going on in my life but I tried and the problem is you would have been great I think now I think they give me a shot now but back
01:09:43
then I submitted my application when I was like 19 so they're still looking at the same application and I'm still in the waiting list so but now I'm in a
01:09:48
relationship and I don't need that so yeah you don't need it now so it's their loss um but I was yeah no went on and I
01:09:56
you know dated a few great guys and actually had had fun and it was good but
01:10:01
I had to because I was so behind the eightball on dating and love and relationships like I had to almost like
01:10:08
in my year of health I had to do like a year of Love experiment before I did that before year of health um to like
01:10:15
kind of put myself out there which was hard and challenging like it's a going on
01:10:21
dates and you got to get all dressed up and you know and then go and have it lunch or dinner with someone that you
01:10:28
might not know whether there's any chemistry and and you were a virgin at to 35 yes yeah that's right yeah so
01:10:34
going on those dates is there is there anxiety in your brain because you know if this date goes well there might be an expectation that I go to the bedroom
01:10:41
with this individual yeah well that was all later I mean weirdly the the guy I lost my virginity to at 35 I was I was
01:10:49
set up with and and I think part of why I think I might have
01:10:55
been attractive was because I was in like a number one movie at the time and whatever and that guy was like an
01:11:02
awesome guy and I'd met him and I'd waited so long at that point I really wanted to lose my virginity to someone
01:11:08
who I was really really into and I and I just I really like this guy I thought he was so funny and cute and um and
01:11:16
potentially like marriage material at the time I met him and so and so when I
01:11:21
did my year of Love experiment that was like a few years later so obviously I I
01:11:27
mean I don't think I could have done it if I was still a virgin and going on all these dates because um at least I had
01:11:34
some experience by that point but I dated like 50 people in the one year in
01:11:39
2019 um to just get some I don't know like to find like cuz I just was behind
01:11:45
the eightball I'd never dated properly um so I needed to get some experience in that area and and legitimately trying to
01:11:53
find the one but um yeah it didn't didn't quite work out you mentioned that
01:11:59
you experimented with a zmek oh I did but I wish I'd known about it in 2020 it
01:12:05
wasn't big then no I didn't even if I had known about it I would have tried it 100% um but more for uh once I'd lost
01:12:14
like 35 kilos I was like I can't continue working out and having this
01:12:21
level of focus like I can't and I was very worried that the weight would come back on and then now like I mean now I
01:12:27
have gained back um 10 kilos or so because of um I guess having a baby I I
01:12:34
just can't work out in the level that I used to and then I directed a movie which was a lot of sitting on a chair
01:12:41
all day long and being stress still stress heaing and which I'll get under control when I'm you know not working 7
01:12:48
days a week um uh and so I've tried it for a few months for like weight
01:12:55
management I guess you guess you'd call it um I definitely noticed that it it
01:13:01
did I have like an unlimited ability to eat sweets and chocolate and ice cream and stuff and that drug helped um for me
01:13:09
not to feel full MH whereas I wouldn't feel like that before I would just could
01:13:14
eat a ton of it like you know um so so I actually actually liked it but um yeah I
01:13:23
know I think I actually think for people like me those drugs can be really effective but obviously I'm not on it
01:13:29
right now but maybe if I you know prescribed it by a doctor I'd go back on
01:13:35
it when you lose weight your resonance with your audience changes as well
01:13:41
because to I I think Adele spoke to it as well and when she lost a lot of weight she there was a
01:13:47
backlash yeah I mean I think there was some people going oh she won't be funny anymore but then I had this movie come
01:13:53
out senior year play a cheerleader who went into a coma and then wakes up 20 years later and uh that was my first big
01:14:01
comedy and it got something like 89 million unique Netflix accounts watch it in the first 10 days around the world
01:14:08
which was huge huge huge number so I was like oh well I think they're probably the people are wrong about that I won't
01:14:15
be funny anymore or but did they feel let down people I think some people did it's like say if you're in a family and
01:14:22
your sibling makes a change for the better and then you feel like ah well it
01:14:27
makes me feel bad because I didn't make the change and it makes me feel not as good about myself so therefore I'm going
01:14:34
to hate them for for changing how dare they change how dare they try to rise
01:14:39
above um and I think there is some attitude but then you think to those
01:14:46
people what would make them happy you go like the John Candy way and you die of a
01:14:51
heart attack or you know something happens to you like you get some serious uh I mean my father
01:14:58
died of a heart attack with complications with diabetes so I was like I was heading towards the diabetes
01:15:05
route if I kept going and I was like well does that make those people happy what you just say as you are and be
01:15:12
unhealthy and then you die prematurely that's not a great outcome like what do those people want but I think as a
01:15:20
comedian you have so many different things in your toolkit uh and mainly your personality and so even though it's
01:15:29
easy to go oh you have that physical irregularity and that's why people love there are so many other elements it's
01:15:35
not as simplistic as that and so I just utilize slightly different things have
01:15:40
you noticed any change in the way that people book you professionally or or respond to you professional or the roles
01:15:45
you're given based on your well now I do a lot more dramatic stuff I mean I'm still obviously doing the comedy stuff I
01:15:51
mean I've just directed a movie which is a big huge new career step but yeah I've
01:15:57
got a movie coming out the arm and the seahorse here in the UK which is totally serious and I just played Lady Capulet
01:16:04
in a film which is totally not what you think I would I would do uh and it's
01:16:09
awesome but it's kind of how I started my career doing Shakespeare and stuff um
01:16:14
before I was bigger and so it's kind of coming back now to to doing that kind of thing but more I noticed um I mean now
01:16:22
I'm kind of in the middle because I'm like I've gained back some weight it was so weird to be to be someone who walks
01:16:30
around the world kind of feeling a bit invisible um attractiveness wise and
01:16:36
then suddenly I lost all this weight and got so much positive validation like it was insane like people would open doors
01:16:43
for you or carry your groceries to the car for you or offer to do something for you or whatever and I just it was so
01:16:50
weird to experience that and I've experienced both sides of the coin like to be kind of being invisible in that
01:16:56
area and then to be visible and it was it was bizarre it was like the attention and I was like oh is this what hot
01:17:02
people feel get all the time um and they get this kind of positive bias in
01:17:08
society all the time um and I got such
01:17:13
positive reinforcement for losing weight um from the press and from people like every single person would make some
01:17:20
comment about it and and it's hard not to fall into liking that and you know
01:17:27
now I've just been too stressed being a director that I've kind of gone off the band Health bandwagon but you've got I
01:17:34
will get back on it 42 years old you underwent IVF and you had your daughter Roy um but it appears you're still a
01:17:41
workaholic you just said earlier about working seven days a week I know I've I've come off a 9mon marathon of seven
01:17:48
days a week I did an action film um called bride hard directed my movie The
01:17:53
Deb written the book and yeah so I'm about to have a holiday what are you
01:17:58
doing it for um cuz you could you know you've got multiple houses all over the
01:18:04
world you've got huge success you've you've you've done it rebel I know and I
01:18:09
and my love life there is a happy story to everyone listening I I have an amazing partner Ramona who's absolutely
01:18:17
an incredible partner um and so that story had had a happy ending as well I
01:18:23
keep saying to people I'm going to retire now you know and then they're like yeah you'll have like 2 days off and then you'll have some idea for a
01:18:30
movie and then you'll want to do it um so I think I'm always that little girl
01:18:36
who at the dog shows was like reaching into bins to collect the aluminum cans to earn money because I felt like I
01:18:42
didn't have anything cuz I didn't have any money and so so part of me is always that I have just have this drive to earn
01:18:49
money um and and that that motivates me and it's weird like I achieve a goal
01:18:57
like coming to America was just to be in one Hollywood movie but then you achieve
01:19:02
it and then it's not enough and then you want you know and now like you know I'd like to win an Oscar or you know um have
01:19:10
that level of success you know winning the Oscars is going to change Zill I know probably not probably like there's
01:19:15
a curse on some women that win the Oscars uh then they sometimes their love life crumbles and they they get no jobs
01:19:23
for 2 years when after they win the Oscar sometimes it's like a curse see you didn't see that in the hallucination what happened after no I didn't see that
01:19:29
I just saw winning and feeling great about it I mean I definitely know I need a break over the summer and I will have
01:19:35
have fun times and I've learned how to have fun now cuz before like in my 20s I didn't even do that I wouldn't even go
01:19:41
on a holiday i' be like no I have to keep working hard are you are you concerned and I'm asking this really for
01:19:47
myself here because I think I am are you concerned that you're going to look back later in life and go you know what I
01:19:54
didn't have my priorities in order yeah maybe and so I think having
01:19:59
my gorgeous daughter and looking at at her she makes me want to like not work
01:20:05
as much and I think I didn't know how she was going to affect my life um and
01:20:11
then now just knowing how much joy it is just to be around her and it makes me
01:20:17
think less about myself and more about her and my family um and so from that
01:20:22
level I want to um not not work as much and I have to be a bit more selective
01:20:28
you one of the things that I found I have to say awesome I'm just going to be honest with you in your book
01:20:34
was um well there's so many things I love the pictures and the whole design of the book and how you weave humor into
01:20:40
what I consider to be pretty important lessons of life but oh you're holding up the redacted
01:20:48
Pages pages that that just have black lines through them which means that you've basically removed those sections
01:20:53
now you well I didn't remove them okay the publisher the UK publisher did because in the in the UK the laws are
01:20:59
different here around what you can say about instances in your life yeah and being a qualified lawyer I know you know
01:21:05
all about defamation laws um and it's a bit um the the US is a bit more free
01:21:13
speech in in terms of defamation laws and the UK and Australia have higher
01:21:18
standards this chapter is called Sasha Barone and other other now obviously I'm just going to take your
01:21:25
lead on this yeah but um this has been a huge story and I saw on your Instagram
01:21:30
some Instagram it's weird because the book is about my whole life you know and yet this particular chapter has gotten
01:21:37
the most attention I guess because I'm saying something negative about a male
01:21:43
comedian Sasha Baron Cohen um and in it describing like the worst professional
01:21:48
experience of my career which was 10 years ago now on a movie called Grimsby
01:21:54
and working with him and it was an experience that left me
01:21:59
feeling humiliated and degraded as a person and and
01:22:05
so that chapter I guess because he's come out and uh denied it it became a a
01:22:12
big story what can you say about that experience I can say why I wrote it um
01:22:22
and purely why it's reductive is um because it's the publisher that gets
01:22:28
sued and obviously they they wouldn't want to get um get sued by somebody who's quite litigious so so that's why
01:22:36
they did that but the story is pretty much out there um so you could easily kind of work out uh what I'm talking
01:22:42
about in the book but I wanted to write it because uh my story is not one of um
01:22:51
you hear stories terrible stories of assault and you know um thing things in Hollywood mine is not
01:22:58
that uh it's more just kind of a situation at work
01:23:04
that the 44y old version of me would have left and would have said H screw
01:23:11
you I'm out of here I'm you know got enough self-esteem to leave and know
01:23:17
this isn't a good situation for me and then back then I stayed in it and and I
01:23:23
did re-shoot on on the film because I didn't want to be seen as unprofessional and this was before the
01:23:30
me to movement and even though I wasn't being treated great I just I thought oh
01:23:37
well I have to be professional um and and I have to stay and and finish it uh
01:23:43
and it was a complicated situation we were both represented by the same agent at the time and um there are a few
01:23:49
things going on and and I guess I wrote it so that people the more people talk
01:23:55
about stuff like this hopefully the less it happens and then also
01:24:01
um just I think I held shame because I went along with it and it's such a fine
01:24:07
line between comb what's comedy and what's playing a character and then really
01:24:13
crossing the line into personal humiliation um and I think on that
01:24:20
project it did it did cross the line and I felt shame that I actively went along
01:24:25
with it and so I guess writing it is kind of releasing the emotions I was
01:24:33
holding on to for that and I have no motivation I mean I write in the chapter
01:24:38
it's not about canceling somebody it's just about um it kind of goes to show
01:24:44
why my self worth wasn't um wasn't where where it should have been and I should
01:24:51
have stood up for myself and that's that's and now the 44y old version of me
01:24:57
would uh handle things much much differently and it's just it was 10
01:25:03
years ago and it was hard to know what to do even though I'm a lawyer and I made the complaints and did what I could
01:25:10
do at the time I now would act very differently this is your life story this
01:25:16
is your Memoir of all the experiences you've had Rebel when you look back through all of these pages and all of
01:25:22
these days and all of these sort of seasons of your life was there a hardest moment oh God there's been so many hard
01:25:31
hard moment I think well probably the darkest point in my life was when I was about 13 and you know you hit puberty
01:25:39
and you feel all these emotions and I felt you know unlovable unworthy
01:25:46
my life wasn't going to be anything um and I was just isolated we were living
01:25:51
out in the bush at that that point where we had like snakes come crawling on the back porch and Bush rats and like I was
01:25:58
just Liv like it just was such a dark time um and that was probably the hard
01:26:05
one of the hardest things what's what's next for Rebel what's well I'm still
01:26:10
directing the movie because I've got all the technical elements to do now so that's a big new challenge and I've
01:26:16
directed this very empowering musical that's very very joyful and and very it's hilarious so I'm very proud of that
01:26:25
um and then I think I don't know I still have because that Vision was I won an
01:26:31
Oscar and I haven't won one so I'd like to do that but then you know I would
01:26:36
just like to be more of a mom who has spends that quality time with her family
01:26:43
and is yeah is that kind of uh person
01:26:48
and not so striving but I don't know I always have this thing in me that I'm very driven and working hard and just
01:26:55
always had that but I would like to maybe let go of that if you were to um go back now to that 13-year-old Rebel
01:27:02
that was going through all of those sort of challenges in her mind and you could tell something say something to her that
01:27:08
would better equipped her to um for the next sort of 20 years to
01:27:13
come because there's going to be lots of you know young women that are struggling with all the things you described and young men oh yeah and I know what it's
01:27:20
like to feel invisible to be so lonely isolated to just not feel like you have
01:27:26
anything going for you like I just a pretty average I mean I was smart I always had being smart but like it's
01:27:34
average no one really looked twice or thought twice about me and and and I know what it's like but it's if you want
01:27:42
to be determined and you want to change your life like you can and you don't have to stay in that situation like you
01:27:49
can actively do things to make your life better and to make it more how you want
01:27:55
and I mean at the time I just had to tell myself that there was nobody around
01:28:00
to to tell me that but to those young people out there I just think
01:28:06
um you you can like you can actively take steps to do it and a great thing is
01:28:13
the creative arts because which can be so many different things like writing or
01:28:18
painting or uh not not just acting and being on a stage all those things cuz
01:28:25
you might not know what your voice is or how to express yourself and those kind
01:28:30
of areas are so important because it can help you find your voice MH um and so I
01:28:37
would say to like to try to encourage you to go into that those kind of
01:28:42
Pursuits even if it's just something you do in your bedroom with a notebook and you're writing song lyrics or you're
01:28:48
yeah writing a diary or something um that form of creative expression can be
01:28:54
really really useful and you're the prime example of that in many respects you went from being that extremely shy
01:29:00
individual to the point as you say that people thought it was some kind of social disorder um to being a Hollywood
01:29:06
Mega star you also went in the personal context you went from being someone who lost their virginity at 35 years old and
01:29:13
wasn't in a relationship and was very sort of clearly avoidant yeah to being which I do slightly regret now like I
01:29:19
was like oh maybe but then yeah I again I do believe that I wouldn't have the career that I had if I'd focused more on
01:29:26
relationships and and health before that there's a lot of people out there that are arriving maybe in their late 30s and
01:29:35
that maybe have hear that clock ticking yeah and then they reflect on the decisions they've made over the last 20
01:29:41
years and they say you know what actually I hear the clock ticking and I do want a family a lot of people also
01:29:47
say I hear the clock ticking I don't some people just don't hear the clock ticking at all yeah um but there's a lot of people that are arriving at that age
01:29:54
and going okay the priorities I had in hindsight now maybe I maybe I got
01:30:02
something wrong here earlier and it's difficult and I think that's really what your your book does so well is it's so
01:30:07
honest about that sort of internal conversation you had with yourself about okay there are changes I need to be made
01:30:13
made if I want to achieve something else and I've decided I want something else and throughout your whole story it's so
01:30:18
clear that you can change yeah and it's never too late to change and it's yeah and I really if anybody listening is
01:30:26
like a late bloomer like like me I mean I don't think there's any shame in that and that's one of the reasons why I put
01:30:32
that virginity story in the book because like on the one hand it's very embarrassing for me to say that but then
01:30:39
if that helps other people out there feel like oh you know okay well Rebel
01:30:45
was like that and look at the life she has now and um so I would want them to
01:30:50
not feel embarrassed about that because doesn't really matter when you Bloom like what age or um you know things have
01:30:58
come to me later in life but I think all that matters is that it it has come to
01:31:03
me um now why am I saying the word come so much talkity I don't know um but I
01:31:12
yeah I just I'm glad that my life turned out you know I didn't get all these awesome things in my 20s it it happened
01:31:20
later and um and and that's okay we have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question
01:31:26
for the next guest not knowing who they're going to be leaving it for MH and the question that's been left for you
01:31:32
is those people that you love the most what is preventing you from spending
01:31:39
enough time hugging them are you able to change this okay so what's so the people I love
01:31:48
the most obviously apart from my family is like my you know my my immediate
01:31:53
family is my daughter and my partner and what's preventing me from hugging them the most is literally physically not
01:32:00
being with them because I'm like out out promoting the book and um uh or if I'm
01:32:08
shooting something and it's not appropriate for the baby to come um so
01:32:13
so not physically being in the same country or or city as them because I'm
01:32:18
working too much and it says are you able to change this and I and I am able to change it by uh not just
01:32:27
accepting too much work and um you know prioritizing the family
01:32:35
more Rebel your book is incredible it's incredible for so many reasons because it seeks to answer those really critical
01:32:41
questions that I think a lot of people are struggling with which is about romance it's about fertility it's about
01:32:46
am I good enough it's about finding love it's about it's an honest reflection of what I think a lot of Workaholics go
01:32:52
through in the modern era while also weaving in a story which I don't think many people know about your early childhood and where you've really come
01:32:57
from and all the odds you've had to fight against coming from where you've come from to get to where you ended up
01:33:03
really remarkable in every sense of the word but you confront the trade-offs which a lot of people don't always talk about those trade-offs we all have to
01:33:09
make because as you said in this conversation you can't have it all in life and so you know you can't have it
01:33:15
all at the same time yeah for sure you can probably have it all just not at the same time yes anything yeah and life
01:33:21
just presents these tra especially for people that are anomalies they have to make even bigger trade-offs than others it's a remarkably funny book um in such
01:33:29
a subtle untry hard way which is 100% but even you in conversation are the
01:33:35
same you're funny without even trying which is remarkable and the almond and the Sea Horse I I was told it was coming
01:33:41
out on the 10th of May yeah in cinemas here in the UK yeah so it's out now and everyone can go and watch it yeah um and
01:33:47
that's about traumatic brain injury it's very serious uh movie and that was where I kissed my first woman in that movie
01:33:54
The French actress Charlotte gainsburg and the rest is history yeah that's yeah
01:33:59
part of my big part of my life on screen Rebel thank you thank you stepen I really appreciate it and it is my most
01:34:06
vulnerable intimate thoughts put out there um but yeah even if like 10 people
01:34:13
relate to it and get something positive out of it that's like that means the world to me and um so even why it's
01:34:20
nerve-wracking having the book out there it's it's awesome at the same time
01:34:28
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