Great friends make sure you feel your best.
Abbott Elementary star Sheryl Lee Ralph has implemented a new policy on set, embracing “no negative body talk.”
According to SheKnows, Ralph’s co-star Lisa Ann Walter who plays the fiery second-grade teacher Melissa Schemmenti on the ABC sitcom, said the new habit has shifted her personal perspective of how she feels about her body.
“When I was growing up… white girls were not supposed to have meat, were not supposed to have booty, were not supposed to have any of it,” Walter, 59, said during a recent red carpet interview. “And as a Sicilian girl who was blessed with [a butt] that people are paying for now, I was taught that didn’t look like a Charlie’s Angel, so I had to be self-loathing.”
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Walter said it wasn’t until she met Ralph, 66, that she could let go of her habit of self-loathing throughout her career.
“One of the things that [Sheryl] has done for me — besides become a beautiful dear friend and besides be [ing] a great cast mate, we feed each other with our acting — is she has said to me, ‘I will not allow any of that negative [body] talk,’” Walter continued. “‘I know you’re making jokes, but I’m not having it anymore. You are beautiful, and this is what it is, and you will own it, and you will love it.’”
Tyler James Williams, who also stars in the sitcom as Gregory Eddie, recently shared how his workout routine to fit the standards for a previous project caused his body to shut down.
“I was really pushing my body to the limit,” he told Men’s Health in January. “By the time December hit, it just crashed. Everything shut down.”
He explained that his early 20s consisted of hiring trainers, heavy lifting, and force-feeding himself. Williams shared the time he chugged down a shake with 1,600 calories, only to throw it all back up. Williams said he entered a stage where he experienced severe stomach pains before an X-ray showed his bowels were inflamed and clogged with scar tissue.