With “I Will Eat You Alive,” Katie Hileman, the director, playwright, and intimacy director, presents the story of three fat women’s journey to lose weight, the social pressure they have felt since they were children, and the horrible things people believe to have agency to say to fat people online simply for existing.
I saw “I Will Eat You Alive” at the Voxel in Charles Village on the opening night of January 26. I am always interested in shows and media that center on fat individuals because they rarely exist without making fat people the subject of ridicule or shame. This play takes those tropes and plays with them in an off-kilter way. On opening night, I watched people around me be moved to tears as they related to what was happening in the play.
The unique set design added a level of intimacy and audience interaction, allowing myself and the rest of the audience to be folded into the story. The set was two rows of tiered seating to the left and right of a long white table. The three main characters and 11 willing audience members were seated as “dinner guests.” A feeling of heaviness and discomfort hung over the set as ‘dining’ with the main characters made the characters’ shame, pain, and discomfort, shown through tight smiles and overly preppy voices, palpable.
Written in what could be described as a love letter to herself, Hileman’s “I Will Eat You Alive” is more than fiction; it is a stylized reality that many fat people may find painfully resonant.
Written in what could be described as a love letter to herself, Hileman’s “I Will Eat You Alive” is more than fiction; it is a stylized reality that many fat people may find painfully resonant.
Hileman’s role as an intimacy director is particularly significant in this instance because she skillfully facilitates a space in which actors understand what is expected of them in hyper-exposed scenes and ensures there is informed consent.
“It’s always my intention to make my actors feel like they have a lot of power, even though they’re putting themselves in these really vulnerable spots and saying some horrible things at times in the play,” Hileman told me.
The day after the opening, I spoke with Hileman and the cast, Vicky Graham, Betse Lyons, and Meghan Taylor, who respectively played Fat Woman 1, 2, and 3. We spoke about our favorite fat characters growing up and how there were not too many of them, our least favorite style options as fat kids in the ’90s and early 2000s, and what it means to be a fat person in this day and age.
Although IWEYA’s run at the Voxel has ended, you can stream it.
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Individually, what does it mean to be a fat person to each of you?
Vicky Graham: It just means that I’m fat. I have weight on me, and I got curves with no speed limits. I think when I was younger, it was just strictly derogatory, something that I would avoid saying at all costs or try to defend myself by using, like, chubby or thick. But I think just the word itself is so short, it’s so simple, and it can just be used for what it is and not have any negative connotations behind it. And that’s something that this show has really helped me learn and embrace so that I have less stress and shame. I just can exist. And this is the adjective that best describes my body.
Betse Lyon: I guess it’s still pretty complicated for me. It’s a lot better than it used to be. I dealt with the terrible ’90s stuff as a teenager. And so I do use fat, simply and sometimes proudly. But there are still little knives in the back of my brain, stabbing me every time I do it.
It’s just a cycle sometimes. It is still hard for me to use the word. But now, at least, it’s more likely that I’ll get frustrated, annoyed, or angry when people are saying bad things about fat folks instead of just retreating into myself, which I feel like getting frustrated and angry is a lot healthier.
Meghan Taylor: I feel like that question’s answer depends on the day. And some days, I don’t know. Being fat means literally nothing to me. It doesn’t define me. It’s just my body. It’s just this vessel that I have to move around in on this planet. But it’s not really indicative of who I am or what I can do or how much I’m worth. But if I’m having a shitty day, then I might be more aware of it. And then it means that being a fat person is like a burden you’re carrying around, and just extra weight, for lack of better terms.
Lately, I’ve been more in a space where I’m like, it really doesn’t mean shit. My body is not me. I mean, my body is me, but my body is not indicative of my worth, what I have to contribute or what I can do, or anything else.
The show does a great job layering general attitudes and acceptances of fatphobia throughout the show through pop culture references, from Kate Moss’ infamous “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” line to the cultural phenomena that was Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers, in a tongue-in-cheek kind of way. What stood out to me was the litany of increasingly violent tweets and messages to fat people that were projected onto the table. Did those come up during the interview that led to this show, or were those aimed at any of you?
Hileman: When I see something really fatphobic on social media, I will take a screenshot of it. It’s shocking to me that people feel such permission to say such horrible things. People don’t think twice about what is said to fat people online. People don’t think that this stuff is actually said about fat people, but it is, and all the time and very casually, and it’s everywhere. So when I had an opportunity to present it back and show people, I took it. I like the dichotomy of them [the characters] saying this stuff and laughing and sort of eating it.”
Lyons: I think about the people, like fat women probably, who are on the receiving end of those actual comments. I have a small amount of popularity on TikTok, and so I have trolls. The shit that people think they can say to you is stunning. As a fat woman in today’s world, I learn to let most of it slide off my back.
It’s awful to include them [the projected messages] because they’re terrible, but it’s also nice because it’s cathartic. Everyone in that room is recognizing how awful they are. And some of the people in that room have never thought about that before.
There is a deeply intimate and personal scene towards the end of the show where the characters strip and essentially lay it bare to the audience. What did that scene mean to you, and how was it having an audience so close during that moment?
Hileman: The audience did exactly what I always intended for that moment to be.
That moment felt so perfect because I don’t think it is a moment about them [the actresses] sexualizing themselves. Although if they want to and they go for it, I love that. I think that’s great.
[It’s about] fat people sexualizing themselves on their own terms. It’s about that freedom. They’ve been so restrained the whole time. By the time they take their clothes off, there’s nothing but them. And we finally get to see them exactly as they are. And so that’s why I love the clothes off moment.
I think that is so visceral, and everyone, by the end of the play, is just so hungry for it. And the fact that they are right there in your face, fully presenting themselves as they are and telling them that they are going to eat you alive.
It’s always my intention to make my actors feel like they have a lot of power, even though they’re putting themselves in these really vulnerable spots and saying some horrible things at times in the play.
Honestly, there’s a lot of trauma in the play, and that’s an understatement that speaks to fat folks’ relationships with their bodies. But I always want my actors to feel like they’re throwing it back in the people’s faces. They are not there to be laughed at or to be ridiculed. They’re there to tell them exactly who they are, which we don’t get to see fat people do.
This is one 75-minute play on this topic, but what do you hope that people take away from the show?
Hileman: I want people to think about how this happens to fat people in their lives, right? This isn’t just a story about these three fat women. I don’t want to assume that it happens to everybody, but I think there are some pretty universal experiences in the play, and I want people to think about how they treat fat people.
It’s not necessarily your fault that you are complicit in it. All the bad things, white supremacy, and patriarchy. This is just like another arm of that — anti-fatness.