Senior staff writer of The Chronicle, Stephanie Woodrow, had the opportunity to talk with Gabrielle Carteris before her presentation.
Chronicle: How did being a ballerina in your childhood affect your body image?
Carteris: I used to dance four to five hours a day, sixdays a week. We used to have contests to see who could eat the least. If you ate more than a piece of bread in a day you lost. I was probably 12 the first time I saw a case of anorexia, of course I didn’t realize what it was back then.
Chronicle: Once you said that you were doing a cast photo and began to cry because the other women on the show were thinner and younger than you and they had never had children. Did your experience on 90210, playing the brainy, not-so trendy character lead to you feeling self-conscious?
Carteris: It’s hard not to be stick-thin-perfect in this business. I felt that it was unfair that others were judging me. I believe in celebrating your body and having other people constantly judge you is hard. But there was a direct correlation between my weight and my work. I was told by every agent I talked to that I needed to lose weight. I even had to lie about my age to get the job on 90210. There’s a lot of age discrimination in this business. The show was so looks oriented, if they knew it was going to turn into that, I wouldn’t have gotten the job.
Chronicle: Why did you decide to leave 90210?
Carteris: Success is not only about being in the right place at the right time, but about knowing when to leave. I had been offered a talk show three years into the series and I knew it was going to get bigger, so I told them to wait so I would be more popular when I left the show. It was also difficult for the writers not knowing what to do with a mother who’s in college.
Chronicle: What was your talk show like?
Carteris: They wanted me to be like Ricki Lake, but I didn’t want that. I think people are smarter than that and I wanted to do a show like ‘Queen for a Day,’ kind of like what Oprah does now and I wasn’t willing to compromise. They wanted me to go into their lives and I didn’t want to do that stuff. People want a higher good and I truly believe that and I love people.
Chronicle: What made you decide to do “The Surreal Life?”
Carteris: When they told me about it I said ‘I’m not going to eat cockroaches on TV. However, I thought it would be a good experience and I left with a strong feeling like I’m a better friend, wife and mother. I’m also proud of the decisions I made after seeing the decision some of the other people made.