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- Aidy Bryant spoke about the final season of the Hulu series, "Shrill," with The Washington Post.
- The season opener was based on a real doctor's appointment she had before filming a 2016 movie.
- "Their assumption is that I have that as a goal," said Bryant, 33.
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Aidy Bryant recalled when a doctor suggested she undergo gastric bypass surgery after assuming she wanted to lose weight.
Bryant spoke with The Washington Post this week ahead of the third and final season of "Shrill," a Hulu TV series that returns with new episodes on May 7. In the article, the 33-year-old "Saturday Night Live" comedian explained that she's not bothered by the word "fat."
"It is a descriptor and, like, I am fat," Bryant told WaPo. "To me, it's like taking the power out of it. It doesn't have to be so loaded. It's just true, and sitting with that, it makes it easier for me. It just feels a little less frightening."
Bryant, who launched a plus-size clothing line in 2019, plays the titular character Annie Easton, an aspiring journalist who's rediscovering a positive relationship with her body.
In the Season 3 premiere, Annie goes to a doctor's appointment for a routine physical but learns that her regular physician is not there. Instead, Annie's appointed a substitute doctor who recommends she undergo gastric bypass surgery to lose weight. According to Bryant, that scene was based on an authentic experience.
"Their assumption is that I have that as a goal, and just by looking at me, they assume that's the reason I'm there at the doctor's office," Bryant told The Post. "And there's an assumption that if you're fat, you've given up on yourself. And it's like, I exercise all the time. I don't eat doughnuts for breakfast, lunch, and dinner."
Bryant added that her real-life appointment was part of a standard insurance process before filming "The Big Sick" in 2016. During the exam, the substitute doctor reportedly lauded the surgery and told her, "People do it all the time."
"Shrill" often addresses fatphobia and fat-shaming faced by Bryant's character, whose quest for self-love has helped shape how larger women are portrayed and perceived on TV. Bryant told The Post she was particularly bothered by media's old reliance on "the fat lady sex scene."
"I can think of about a million examples, and I won't name names, where sex between a plus-sized woman and a man is represented by her jumping on him and then he falls over," Bryant told WaPo. "That's a classic. And there's something so demeaning and devastating about that to me. It feels like trying to joke it away rather than sincerely finding an actual funny moment. In a normal sex scene between two normal-sized people, you could still find comedy in that. And I think our show does."