Ruth Jones' fat opportunities

Ruth Jones thinks there are plenty of roles for fat actors these days.

The curvaceous 'Gavin and Stacey' star - who is set to play 20-stone comedy legend Hattie Jacques in a BBC4 biopic - says TV bosses are a lot more open-minded than they once were, and consider all shapes and sizes for their shows.

She said: "Hattie Jacques may have been stereotyped in the Sixties and Seventies but things have moved on. I don't think we have the same over¬simplified, sizeist view now.

"There are many roles for larger actors. I've been given many parts which are not just, 'Oh, we need a fat person to play this character'."

Ruth - who recently lost three stone - claims she wasn't offended by being handed the part of larger-than-life Hattie, who was famously so big she wore tents in the 'Carry On' movies, as she wanted to reveal the true person behind the famous face.

She added to the Daily Mail newspaper: "She was an incredibly talented woman. Hattie famously used to say, 'If you're fat, you're funny', so I wanted to find the real person behind the funny fat persona."