Singer-actress Jennifer Hudson says she turned down the title role in Oscar nominated film Precious because she didn’t want to pack on the weight required to adequately portray the role.
In her new book, I Got This: How I Changed My Ways and Lost What Weighed Me Down , Hudson reveals that not long after she won a Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for playing singer Effie White in the 2006 film Dreamgirls , she was approached by director Lee Daniels and asked to consider playing Precious .
While Hudson admitted that the thought of playing an abused and overweight single teen mom was compelling, the 100 or so pounds she would have to add to her frame to take on the part was a deal breaker.
“I had [gained weight] with Effie [in Dreamgirls],” she writes in her memoir. “And as much as I was moved by this film, I wanted to try a role that had nothing whatsoever to do with my weight.”
After Hudson rejected the Precious role, director Lee Daniels cast Gabourey Sidibe, a then-unknown actress who eventually was nominated for an Oscar for her performance in the film. Jennifer went on to co-star in the first Sex and the City Movie alongside Sarah Jessica Parker.
US Weekly points out that since hitting the American Idol stage on the show’s third season, Hudson has dropped an incredible 80 pounds with a little help from Weight Watchers and even opened Chicago’s Jennifer Hudson Weight Watchers Center.
Watch Jennifer Hudson in the Weight Watchers ad “I Can” below:
