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Nancy McKeon admits “there was a lot” of talk about the cast’s weight behind the scenes on “The Facts of Life.”
While McKeon — who starred in the ’80s sitcom with Lisa Whelchel, Kim Fields and Mindy Cohn — doesn’t get into specifics, she reveals there were discussions about what the cast should eat and how much they should weigh.
“Each one of us had to deal with things in our own way,” she tells Page Six in an exclusive interview.
The NBC TV series, which ran from 1979 to 1988, centered around a private all-girls school in Peekskill, NY, and was groundbreaking for dealing with issues like drug use, eating disorders and peer pressure.
McKeon, 58, who played tomboy Jo Polniaczek, says that it was ironic she and the other actresses were being questioned about their weight when a lot of the sitcom’s storylines centered around their journeys through puberty.
“There’s so much development [during those years],” she says, so having it “made [into] a thing” didn’t feel right.
“The Division” alum notes, however, she understood. “That’s why it’s called show business, it’s a business, and they wanted what they wanted. But we’re also human beings and the fact is everybody comes in all shapes and sizes and everybody needs to be represented.”
“There is no one ideal [body]. There should be an embrace of every body.”
McKeon’s next project is the off-Broadway show, “Pen Pals” from Feb. 5-9.
The show is about two women, one in New Jersey and one in the UK, who have maintained a pen-pal friendship for over 50 years.
“It’s beautifully written. Its themes are friendship and life,” she says, before noting that the idea of pen-pals is hopelessly old-fashioned for many.
“Time moves forward and there are connections in different ways,” she explains, adding that although “texting is great,” there is something “different about letter writing because you literally had to think about what you wanted to say and crafted it.”
“If you were writing in pen, you couldn’t just erase or delete it and no emojis, too…You really had to put thought into it.”
McKeon, who played the same role last year, says that she has been touched by the audience’s reaction.
“What people are saying is, that they love the connection, they love feeling like they’re a part of the friendship.”
