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Coyote Ugly star says she was body shamed on set: 'Starving myself'

Melanie Lynskey has shared how she was body shamed on the set of Coyote Ugly, 22 years ago.

During an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the Yellowjackets star, 44, recalled the painful memories of being body shamed and pressured to lose weight while shooting the film.

Coyote Ugly star Melanie Lynskey
Coyote Ugly star Melanie Lynskey has revealed she was body shamed on the set of the film, despite 'starving' herself. Photo: Getty

"All the girls had this regimen they had to go on. It was ridiculous," Lynskey explained. "I was already starving myself and as thin as I could possibly be for this body, and I was still a [size] four. That was already people putting a lot of Spanx on me in wardrobe fittings and being very disappointed when they saw me, the costume designer being like, 'Nobody told me there would be girls like you.'

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"Really intense feedback about my physicality, my body, people doing my makeup and being like, 'I'm just going to help you out by giving you a bit more of a jawline and stuff.'

"Just the feedback was constantly like, 'You're not beautiful. You’re not beautiful.' In your early 20s, so much of it is about beauty, and how people respond to you, and do people want to f*** you?"

Melanie Lynskey in Coyote Ugly
Melanie said her feedback from the costume department and the makeup team was, 'You're not beautiful'. Photo: Touchstone Pictures

It's not the first time Melanie has opened up about this kind of pressure, revealing to Vulture that she faced similar criticism after her breakout role in 1994's Heavenly Creatures.

The actress shared that at the time she was often reminded that she was not "thin, confident, pretty".

"Mostly thin," she said. "There was a certain pleasant energy they wanted people to have. Unchallenging. And I wasn’t successful doing that."

Melanie Lynskey
Melanie says she was grateful to get her role in Yellowjackets, as it didn't require her to lose weight or look younger than she is in order to play the role. Photo: Getty

Melanie said she struggled to lose weight and would engage in disorder eating behaviours such as starvation diets and throwing up after eating. Thankfully, her boyfriend at the time pointed out the dangers of such things.

She also recently shared with People that she was grateful to get her role in Yellowjackets, as it didn't require her to lose weight or look younger than she is in order to play the role.

"I had a lot of beliefs when I started about what I was supposed to look like," she told the magazine earlier this year. "It feels very nice to be in a body that I'm comfortable in, to be aging and have people want to cast me."

For confidential support about eating disorders and body image issues you can free call the Butterfly Foundation National Hotline on 1800 33 4673.

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