“Brown Sugar” Screenwriter Wants To Cast A Plus-Size Love Interest In His Next Romantic Comedy

Great news! Michael Elliot, the talented screenwriter responsible for movie night favorites like Brown Sugar and Just Wright has another romantic comedy in the works, but he needs your help.

The award-winning writer recently rolled out a new crowdfunding campaign through which he hopes to tackle Hollywood’s beauty standards. The campaign is called “Project Plus-Size Movie Star” and Elliot is working towards casting a curvy beauty as the love interest in his new film.

“The media, especially television and film, significantly affects how and what we think,” said Elliot. “By rarely ever seeing plus-size women as love interests in films, Hollywood is perpetuating a view that plus-size women aren’t desirable, sexy, or beautiful, and that they are unimportant. This is a message that needs to change, and this film – and hopefully the films that could be made as a direct result of it – will play a significant role in changing this message.”

Elliot went on to say that storylines that always end with model-thin women always the guy sends the message that the average woman is not beautiful or is unworthy to be the object of someone’s affection.

“I loved Queen Latifah as the reassuring best friend in Brown Sugar, but I loved her more in my film Just Wright, where she rocked a sexy black dress in the film’s first five minutes, owned a home, was accomplished in her career, and played the film’s romantic lead – without a single reference to her weight or body type,” Elliot said.

So far, the campaign has raised $135 of its $1, 250,000 goal.

“I believe that if this campaign reaches and exceeds its funding goal, it will send a message to Hollywood that there is tremendous support for films that feature plus-size women in starring roles,” said the husband and father. “And should this film do well at the box office or in television ratings, Hollywood studios and networks will see the economic viability of films starring plus-size actresses, and fund more of them. More positive images of plus-size women in film will not only affect how women, including my own daughters, view themselves and how others – both men and women – view other women, but begin to destroy the longstanding Hollywood ideal of beauty that is neither realistic nor accurate.”

Head over to Indiegogo to learn more about “Project Plus-Size Movie Star”.

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