'Bodyguard' star Richard Madden recalls being told to lose weight: 'It doesn't just happen to women'

Richard Madden works hard for the super-fit physique he displays on the BBC series Bodyguard and elsewhere.

It’s not all his choice, if he wants to keep his job as an actor.

“I’ve done numerous jobs where you’re told to lose weight and get to the gym,” Madden said in the May issue of British Vogue. “It doesn’t just happen to women, it happens to men all the time as well.”

Madden, 32, said he’s had to squeeze into costumes that made it difficult for him to breathe. He’s had fat pinched on his body, even though his body appears to be nothing but muscle in racier episodes of his series. It’s not at all a look that non-celebrities — people without personal trainers, gourmet chefs and hours to spend working on their body — can hope to attain.

“We’re projecting a very unrealistic body image,” Madden continued. “I find myself with actor friends — after we’ve done a kind of barely eating, working-out-twice-a-day, no-carbing thing for these scenes — looking at each other going: ‘We’re just feeding this same s*** that we’re against.’”

Madden’s comments were similar to those of singer Sam Smith, who spoke up about body image in a February post on Instagram.

The “Too Good at Goodbyes” singer shared a shirtless selfie with a poignant caption, in which he said he usually starved himself “for weeks in advance” of photo shoots.

Hollywood’s women have complained for decades about the pressure they face to maintain a perfect body, either too fat or too thin.

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