Jennifer Coolidge says friend said She’d Be ‘out of Her Mind’ to Pass on ‘White Lotus’

• Jennifer Coolidge is an American actress.
• Jennifer Coolidge played Tanya McQuoid in The White Lotus.
• She initially turned down the role because she didn’t feel like she was in “fighting shape” for the part.

Jennifer Coolidge is an American actress and comedian. Born and educated in Boston, Massachusetts, she trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Primarily noted for her roles in comedic films and television.

If Jennifer Coolidge’s buddy hadn’t given her some important advice, she probably would have missed out on one of the biggest opportunities of her career.

She was on the fence about joining the new project long before Coolidge received a 2022 Emmy nomination for outstanding supporting actress in a limited series or TV movie for her role as Tanya McQuoid in The White Lotus. The actress acknowledges that her initial reluctance was a result of her insecurities about her weight gain during the pandemic.

“It was COVID, [I was] locked up with this very nice girl that I knew in New Orleans. She was sort of a friend [and] my house sitter,” Coolidge, 60, exclusively tells. “It was just very lonely times … and so she and I got obsessed with these vegan pizzas and we were eating a lot of them each day.”

“The number kept increasing,” continues the actress, who recently put her luxury resort experience from the show to good use as part of a Marriott Bonvoy Moments experience in Orange County. “You can sort of numb out any worry you have in the world if you just eat another pizza. … And not that I was 110 pounds before, but somehow it led to my demise.”

“I did say, ‘If we could just do this later,'” she recalls. “And then [Mike] was sort of like, ‘No, we’re doing it now. I just got approved by HBO … October, we’re going to Hawaii and we’ve got the Four Seasons, we’re filming it there.'”

“I was like, ‘I just don’t think I can do that.’ I had no time, I can’t work out,” she explains of her reaction. “It was sort of weird, it was not that big a difference from what I usually looked like, but somehow it became my excuse not to do it. For whatever reason, I didn’t feel like I was in fighting shape.”

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