star Camilla Luddington has said she wasn't hired for a CW show because the casting director didn't think she was "pretty enough." Luddington plays Dr. Josephine "Jo" Wilson in the series, having joined the cast in 2012.
She hosts the podcast alongside her friend and former star Jessica Capshaw. Capshaw became a regular on the medical drama as pediatric surgeon Arizona Robbins. She left in March 2018 after starring in 11 seasons of the hit show.
Although Luddington and Capshaw's characters weren't close on , the pair became friends off-screen. Now the two women talk about their lives and share interesting stories on their podcast. On Monday, the pair discussed beauty standards in the entertainment industry for their episode "Call It Photoshop.
" "I wanna know if you have ever—because I have a story—have ever lost a role based on your looks. Because I, back in the day, auditioned for a CW show that I did not get and the casting director's feedback was, I was not pretty enough for the CW," Luddington claimed. emailed a spokesperson for CW for comment on Wednesday.
Laughing in frustration, Capshaw responded: "Not pretty eno—excuse you CW! Like, says who, first of all." "You know what's funny, I was like 'What the f—what the f*** ever,' I was like 'Whatever. Moving on.
' It honestly didn't, like, I think because at that point I'd had so many no's in my career I was like, 'Joke's on you, get in line with the rejection,'" Luddington said. Capshaw apologized to her fellow actor for the fact that she had to go through such an experience before explaining that actors are trained to be like "Teflon." She then questioned who sets beauty standards.
"You can't even take it seriously. But I guess what it brings up is what is, what is, what is pretty? Like, how do we understand what pretty is? What is pretty to that person? Was it a groupthink, like all of them decided that? One person decided that?" she questioned. "Like, I think that is kind of where things start which of course end up being the question of what are the beauty standards and how do they get set and who sets them and obviously how much they change from, you know, family to family, town to town, city to city, country to country, you know, culture, it all influences what is pretty or beautiful or whatever.
" She then opened up about a similar experience of her own where she was told to lose weight for a role, saying: "I actually very specifically lost a job early in my career because I wasn't thin enough. "And I remember I auditioned for it, it was like a rom-com, and it would have been a very big break for me and um, I really wanted it and I worked really really hard on it and I went in and auditioned." Capshaw explained that she went through three different stages before making it to the director, who she said was a "lovely guy.
" He told her he thought she was "fantastic" and was her pick for the film but her manager had some bad news. "My manager said 'OK, here's the deal, you're the pick, the head of the studio thinks that you need to be thinner. Like they, they just, they do,'" she said.
Capshaw couldn't remember whether she was given 10 days or two weeks to lose weight, to which Luddington responded: "10 days? What are you going to do, lose a limb?" "Honestly, it was so ridiculous ...
the end of the story was, I was given those 10 days and I went in to meet the head of the studio and I don't even know if it was because I wasn't thin—I mustn't have been thin enough, I didn't get the job," Capshaw said. "The irony was, the person that did, was actually quite well known in the business for having disordered eating, having issues with disordered eating ..
. the standard of beauty was thin." Luddington added: "Yeah, I would say it was worse then.
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