Renee Zellweger speaks out against 'tabloid speculation' that she had plastic surgery
'Not that it’s anyone’s business, but I did not make a decision to alter my face and have surgery on my eyes'
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Your support makes all the difference.Renée Zellweger spoke out against the intense scrutiny by media outlets on her appearance over the past year, dismissing claims that she had plastic surgery and criticising the “tabloid speculations” reported by news sites.
In an essay published on The Huffington Post entitled “We Can Do Better”, Zellweger, 47, wanted to “make some claim on the truth of [her] life”, calling the evolution of “tabloid fodder” to the topic of mainstream discussion “troublesome”.
“Not that it’s anyone’s business, but I did not make a decision to alter my face and have surgery on my eyes,” she said, dismissing the 2014 speculation that arose after a red carpet appearance.
“This fact is of no true import to anyone at all, but that the possibility alone was discussed among respected journalists and because a public conversation is a disconcerting illustration of news/entertainment confusion and society’s fixation on physicality.”
Zellweger won an Academy Award for her 2003 performance in Cold Mountain. She is set to appear in the third installment of Bridget Jones’ Diary in September.
The actor’s essay comes at a moment when the standards placed on women in entertainment are being called out by the subjects themselves.
Friends actor Jennifer Aniston wrote a similar essay, also on Huffington Post, that was critical of tabloid speculation about her body.
“I am not pregnant,” she wrote. “I’m fed up with the sport-like scrutiny and body shaming that occurs daily under the guise of ‘journalism’, the ‘First Amendment’, and ‘celebrity news’.”
And in June, musician Sky Ferreira responded to an article published in LA Weekly that made her sex appeal the focus of the review rather than her music. At one point, the male reviewer compliments Ferreira’s “killer tits”.
“Ninety-five per cent of articles and interviews about me have had something offensive, false, or (sometimes extremely) sexist,” she tweeted. “...You’re either too fat or too thin or too pretty or ugly. That’s what I have been told my whole life since I was a little girl. …
“At this point, I care about the work I make because that’s what actually lasts and matters.