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Jennifer Love Hewitt Reflects On Being Asked 'Gross' Questions About Her Body As Young Actress

Jennifer Love Hewitt Reflects On Being Asked 'Gross' Questions About Her Body As Young Actress
Chelsea Guglielmino/WireImage/Getty Images

Back in the late 90s, Jennifer Love Hewitt was the next big thing.

She burst onto the scene in Party Of Five. Then she got her bearings as a "scream queen" in I Know What You Did Last Summer.

Eventually she'd move to TV for the critically acclaimed Ghost Whisperer. Hewitt is now a featured actor on the Fox show 9-1-1.

But after watching Blaming Britney Spears, Hewitt said she wasn't looking back on her early career with as much fondness.

Hewitt, now 42, said a section of the documentary had her thinking about when she would be asked "gross" questions about her body in her early career.

Party Of Five premiered in 1994, when Hewitt was just 15.

"It's interesting, I just watched the Britney Spears documentary, and there's that whole section in there talking about her breasts..."
"At the time that I was going through it, and interviewers were asking what now would be incredibly inappropriate, gross things, it didn't feel that way. I mean, I was in barely any clothing the whole movie.
"For some reason, in my brain, I was able to just go: OK, well, I guess they wouldn't be asking if it was inappropriate."





But now, Hewitt says she looks back on it "and [goes], ew."

"And it really started with 'I Know What You Did Last Summer,' because that was the first time that I had worn a low top, and on 'Party of Five,' my body was very covered.
"At a press junket for 'I Know' or 'I Still Know What You Did Last Summer,' I remember purposely wearing a T-shirt that said 'silicone free' on it because I was so annoyed, and I knew something about boobs was gonna be the first question out of their mouths."

I Know What You Did Last Summer was released in 1997 when Hewitt was only 18.




Hewitt also said that by the time Heartbreakers came out in 2001, she was absolutely sick of the body questions.

"I was really tired of that conversation. With 'Heartbreakers', that was a big part of it."
"I was disappointed that it was all about body stuff, because I had really worked hard in that movie to do a good job as an actress."

Hewitt was just 22 in 2001.





She concluded:

"Now that I'm older, I think: Gosh, I wish that I had known how inappropriate that was so I could have defended myself somehow or just not answered those questions."
"I laughed it off a lot of the time, and I wish maybe I hadn't."

Hollywood and the American public have a lot to answer for when it comes to the treatment of women in the entertainment industry.