Why Bebe Rexha 'Cried' Watching Ariana Grande Discuss Body Image
Bebe Rexha is more than sympathetic to Ariana Grande's recent pleas for fans to stop commenting on other people's bodies.
The "Can't Stop Drinking About You" singer dropped by to speak with Access Hollywood’s Scott Evans about her third studio album, Bebe, which hit the shelves on April 28, but the two shifted gears during their conversation to focus on toxic Hollywood beauty standards and the negative impact fans commentary on a person's body can have on them.
Rexha revealed that when she was first starting out in the industry, her team at the time encouraged her to get liposuction and other cosmetic procedures despite only weighing 127 pounds.
More recently, Rexha was hurt by TikTok's new feature which shows a suggested search at the top of the comments based on what users are looking up. On a video about the singer, the suggested search was "Bebe Rexha weight."
Rexha tweeted a screenshot of the phrase, writing, "Seeing that search bar is so upsetting."
So when she saw Grande's video addressing the internet's response to a set of photos captured by paparazzi while she and her Wicked co-star Cynthia Erivo attended Jeff Goldblum's concert in London, she was so moved she cried. "That really broke my heart," she told Evans.
The comments that Grande was responding to read something like, "I pray Ariana Grande isn’t battling anorexia or bulimia. She doesn’t look well. Her old weight was gorgeous & healthy!" as one Twitter user wrote in part.
In a selfie-style video shot as Grande prepared to leave for set one morning, the "Side to Side" singer pleaded with anyone watching to keep comments about other people's bodies to themselves, no matter how well-intentioned they were.
"The body that you've been comparing my current body to was the unhealthiest version of my body," she admits at one point. "I was on a lot of antidepressants, and drinking on them, and eating poorly, and at the lowest point of my life when I looked the way you consider my healthy, but that, in fact, wasn't my healthy."
In response, Rexha shared, “I could only imagine how she felt...everybody talking about you and talking about your appearance.” Especially, she adds, while Grande is doing something she "really loves"—filming a movie. "It's her dream, like, let her have that moment...you don't know what she's going through, you don't know what's happening in her life. Let her figure it out for herself."
Rexha also revealed that she has polycystic ovary syndrome, which can cause a person to gain a lot of weight, among other physical symptoms, which in turn can incite a barrage of unwarranted and unwelcome comments from others. "A lot of people don't know what people are going through, so sometimes it's better not to say anything."