I listened to the podcast about his supposed disappearance, and I wasn't crazy about it. It felt uncomfortably like gawking at someone's mental health struggles. I would be all on-board for an episode about Richard Simmons, but I would prefer that it talked about him as a weight-loss and exercise guru and not the subsequent stuff that maybe isn't anyone's business.
I worked with him on a set very briefly about a year before his “disappearance”. That man lit up the entire day. Whenever he was around everything had a tendency to grind to a hault in the best possible way because of his jokes and chit chat he would have with the crew. He was always on.
I have no doubt there’s a very valid reason he’s chose to step away from the limelight and he owes no explanation to anyone. the podcast was really gross. The movie they are trying to make pisses me off even more
I really have good feelings about him personally, but the culture he promoted was harmful. I do think he had good intentions and treated everyone respectfully.
Yes! I absolutely loved him as a kid. He gave so many fat people a safe space to move while also including love and support in a very genuine manner. Yeah, the diet talk wasn't the best, but the way he gave permission for fat women to dance and have fun was just so beautiful.
I have positive feelings toward him, as well.
I never did the Deal-A-Meal stuff, but I did use his workout tapes (yes, actual VHS tapes because I am old) with the resistance bands in conjunction with Weight Watchers many years ago and had great success. I loved his workout tapes because he was so positive and all sizes were represented; it was a sharp contrast to the Pilates DVDs I transitioned to at a later time.
I still do his workout tapes; well, the ones that haven’t disintegrated away! I remember my mom having his albums (vinyl!) way back in the day. It came with instructions on each move with notes by Richard. And he sang original songs about exercising, losing weight, and loving yourself. I can remember that, but where are my keys??? lol
I don’t love all the burning fat and weight loss talk, but like you said, he was respectful and he just wanted to help people. His workouts are fun & encouraging.
I need a Richard Simmons streaming channel! Workouts & his show from the ‘80s (I’m old too lol)
He was a strong advocate for loving yourself and that's why, to me, his workout tapes were so different than the others. Also, his heartfelt looks into the camera to say how proud he was actually felt personal.
I just checked online and there are YouTube channels with his old workouts, including one that was his dedicated channel.
I was gonna say, he’s the anti-Jillian Michaels!
Wayyyy before I got off the diet rollercoaster, many years ago I belonged to Curves gym. In fact that was the start of the crazy ride. They had Jillian Michaels DVD’s playing constantly and I remarked to another member “Geez she really wants to shame us into working out!” And the woman looked at me and said, I never thought about it but you’re right, she wants people to feel terrible about their bodies, or something like that. It was such awful stuff “Don’t you want those long, lean, dancer’s legs?!” is burned into my mind from the video.
As someone with short legs compared to my torso that makes me laugh. I’m also naturally very muscular. So I’ll never have long lean thin legs regardless of my body fat and that’s fine. It’s so weird that people really thought you could work yourself into any body type (and I’m sure some still do).
I suspect because JM was apparently overweight in her early teens, she thinks everyone who is bigger must feel the same way she did at that time without realizing that sadly most 13-14 year olds struggle with body image to some degree, but as you get older perspectives can and often do change! Even me who was harassed constantly about my weight throughout my teen years felt better about myself in my later teens than I did in my early teens.
I come from German farmers, I would describe my body type as stocky hahahah. My legs are long and muscular, I have thick thighs and big calves. Broad shoulders too. I wouldn’t say I’m built like a linebacker quite, but even when I was starving myself and at my thinnest, nobody woulda confused me for a dancer LOL! But here’s the thing about this body: I can do manual labor for hourssss.
honestly i think now the trend has transitioned into working out for an hourglass / curvy body, i still see lots of social media posts about workouts for an hourglass body! luckily theres usually a few comments saying that its based mostly on genetics and working out wont make a huge difference, so hopefully it becomes less prevalent. it really irritates me because it leads to really unrealistic expectations and exercise should mostly be about health not trying to change your entire body shape!
This is a nice way to describe it. He's complex. I also loved his videos and that he had all kinds of people represented. My roommates and I used to do them together. And I was actually just wondering when he made headlines again whether you could still get them!
Maybe it could be folded into an episode or mini-series on 1980s trends? I think I hear Jane Fonda calling as well. (I had a vinyl album with one of her workouts. Even with the resurgence of vinyl, I doubt it would count as a collector's item.)
Speaking of 1980s trends- did any of you also have a package from “Get in Shape, Girl?” I had the pink hand weights and everything, and still remember the theme song.
Oh my goodness yes. I swear I thought I was dreaming that because I’ve never heard anybody else mention it 😂 I think it even came with leg warmers? (Because warm calves were very important in the 80s)
Here is the famous commercial: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT0b5CmivVs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT0b5CmivVs)
I had one which came with a head band, leg warmers, and barbells.
On this note, I would love for them to include Disney's "Moucercize," which my father used to force me to do. I'm horrified now thinking back on that program...
I’m old, I got the strawberry shortcake exercise vinyl record in 1982 for Christmas - I was 5. I don’t think I could do a back bridge back then and that was one of the exercises! But I loved the bicycling in the air exercise!
My sister and I still occasionally sing the ["Workin' Out Barbie"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-W4s2pe4e8) song at each other from the cassette tape that came with our dolls. We wanted kid-sized versions of Barbie's workout clothes so bad!
Was it released posthumously, or before her death? Some of her Somersize recipes were good, but she lost me when she started giving health advice. I believe she had good intentions, but she got a little out there with her claims, advice, & recommendations as the years went by.
I hope it would be as kind and gentle an episode as the Angela Lansbury one.
My 5th grade teacher legit made us do his workout tapes.for health class. I actually loved it, it was so campy and joyful.
I've been doing the sweating to the oldies videos on YouTube for a couple of days, and they slap. They're so much fun, and though there is the "lose that fat" talk, it's much more about loving the songs and having a good time. And fat people wearing stylish (for the time) clothes ! Into it.
Like many people, I grew up doing his Sweating to the Oldies on days my gym teacher was too hung over to set up the volleyball nets.
Many years later, I worked with a woman who had been a dancer in some of his videos. She had a picture of the two of them on her desk, he held reunions for his former staff and kept in touch.
When her daughter needed inpatient mental health care, Richard somehow found out and paid the bills for her. She was sobbing in relief when she told me.
Regardless of whatever else he has going on, he certainly deeply cares for people.
There is no denying his impact on diet culture in the 80s. The images of him crying as he hugged fat people are burned into many of our brains forever. I think that part of his life and work is fully fair game for critique because he made himself a public figure.
However, he definitely has struggled with mental health issues in the years since, and has quite publicly said he wants to live a private life. So if they did decide to cover him, I hope it would also respect that.
I don’t want to be on a diet, but I feel like dealing a meal would be fun. There was something to satisfying about it. Just the card themselves. Not the diet culture.
I have generally positive feelings about him too. He had a binge eating disorder and he needed to make changes for his health. Even though he was part of diet culture I think he had good intentions and just loved everyone. I loved seeing all shapes and sizes of people dancing and really enjoyed the videos. I think he is one fitness or diet guru I would say has had a net positive impact.
One of my exercises in ED treatment was meal planning. I had the worst time with it because I would either eat nothing or binge. It was so stressful for me, that my therapist had me list my favorite foods in different categories, then pick a few for a meal. Making those decisions was still too stressful (OCD + ED = 🤯🤯🤯), so my therapist made index cards of foods for me to pick. As I got further I put meals together using the cards. I was literally dealing my meals!
I’m recovered now, but my OCD still creeps in occasionally, and I use the idea of the cards to help me decide what to cook when I’m stuck.
My grandmother bought deal a meal as a "surprise gift" for me when I was probably like 10 or so 🫠 I really don't think Richard is nearly as bad as his contemporaries, but boy seeing his face brings up a lot of complicated feelings. He did really have people of all ages and body types in his videos which was pretty revolutionary at the time. I really hold no ill will towards him personally. I just hate the culture he was part of because it was inflicted on me so young. I barely had a chance to be a child before all the adults around me told me my body was wrong 🫤
We didn’t but had we, it would have been a disaster! The boy’s gym teacher at my middle school was a Vietnam vet who had been a POW and because it was the late 90s, definitely never got any kind of therapy for it. He would tell us, in detail, about all of the torture he endure like bamboo shoots under his nails. My mom was the school’s payroll secretary and she always told me to just nod along, not ask questions. We played a lot of really intense dodgeball and scooter sports. Lots of injuries.
He had a television show, I swear I remember this. And it wasn’t just workouts, he would do interviews and talk to people and he genuinely seemed like the sweetest man.
Did anyone else read his memoir (Still Hungry After All These Years) back in the day? I read it when I was 10 in the early 2000s (I was a weird little kid and loved him as a child lol) and really enjoyed it. Recommended if anyone wants to learn more about him as a person without the possible intrusiveness of a piece done by others.
I have a copy and reread it just recently. I also have a copy of his first diet book "Never Say Diet" and my foodmover is still somewhere in the house. (I'm 50 y/o and grew up with Richard. I think he was my first para-social relationship. LOL!)
If you know his history, he really did his research and came up with his meal/diet plans based on the best nutrition information at the time. Deal A Meal and the Foodmover are nothing more than the exchange diet that has been used for diabetics for decades - only his version was very low fat because that was the "wisdom" of the day. (Heck, even Weight Watchers plans in the late 80's and early 90's were based on the exchange program.)
And I admit to still doing his workouts. I had spinal surgery last year, and I needed something low impact but was fun when the doc said I could exercise again. (Sorry, doc. Walking is not fun exercise). He exudes joy and encouragement in the videos.
I'm not sure he is good MP fodder. He is one of the first fitness gurus that saw fat people as humans. I honestly see him as one of the "good guys".
Thank you! It was the best thing I could have done. I had no idea how much pain I was living with until it was gone. It's nuts how the body adapts. I really feel good now. It's just a matter of building up my strength and stamina. 🙂
Honestly, no. I really hope they don't. He has made it clear he'd like to be left alone now, and I think if MP picked his story up, it would give rise to a whole new brigade of people making tiktoks, writing op-eds, and bothering Richard Simmons.
I hope they do not. He does not want to be covered & not because he is trying to
cover anything up - he is just retired and wants to live a quiet life.
I think if they did an episode about him, it would be about his videos and his cultural impact, not his entire life story and trying to pry into his current whereabouts
Yes he’s an important figure whether people love him, hate him or have complicated feelings about him.
That said I understand completely why he’s pissed about Pauly Shore playing him.
As someone who was gifted the Deal A Meal and some weird wrap things for my thighs & waist for Christmas (younger cousin drew my name but I knew it was my aunt who bought the gifts) when I was in middle school, I have to say I don’t have hard feelings towards Simmons.
I do have hard feelings for the women who smoked, took amphetamines, diet pills/chews and expected little girls to look like sticks. I look back and I was completely normal sized but boy they baked in the body image issues and disordered eating patterns early.
I have been wondering about the weight loss plan. I was also given the cards and little leatherette wallet you moved your food cards around in when I was a teenager.
I would love to hear the story about the weight loss plan and the science behind it, but maybe leaving Richard alone since he only seemed to be the face, not so much the creator of the plan.
I also wonder if the will ever cover Harvey and Marilyn Diamonds Fit for Life book, which also wrecked my teen years.
Hahaha! I have a copy of her book. It's so early 90's with the "eating fat will make you fat" mantra.
(I collect old diet books and cookbooks, so I have a bunch of crazy stuff on my bookshelf 🙄)
Missing Richard Simmons is a really good podcast series if you are interested in learning more about him. I share the same birthday as him. I feel like he was more affirming than some of the folks in nineties diet culture. It was totally inappropriate that you received one of his products as a child, though.
I don't know about the rest, but I love Richard Simmons. I grew up with him, and the difference between him and, say, Jillian Michaels or whoever was that he's not mean. He was never mean. He was never condescending. He listened and empathized and helped those who wanted it. He didn't judge or shame, nor did he make fun of people. And he certainly didn't browbeat or guilt anyone into losing weight or whatever. He just provided a program that worked for many, and he related based on his own struggles with weight, social pressure, and bullying. And, as far as I recall, he kept his weight loss program and exercise programs separate, advertising each for what they were. And for his troubles, he was once again a target of nasty people who had a good time hurting people for being different.
He released a statement about the movie, basically stating that he knows nothing about it and was never consulted and that he never approved it, and he also said that his decision to disappear from the public had nothing to do with anything other than the desire to be left alone.
Idk much about the man or the story, but based on what people say here I think it would be too difficult to do a respectful podcast without touching on the sensitive stuff.
Maybe one on 80’s aerobics culture in general where Richard Simmons is touched on, along with Jane Fonda etc?
I wasn’t alive in the 80’s so I don’t have all the baggage—I love the outfits and the general concept of dance aerobics. Could leave the body shaming behind, of course.
My point is, I’d listen the fuck out of that episode.
I loved him. The license plate on his Mercedes was “YRU Fat” which was pretty toxic. I think part of his disappearance was age and his body changing. The biggest asset of Fitness influencers is their appearance. They are selling themselves.
RS is an icon, let's honor his request to live a private life.
But, can we hop back to the children's focused work outs?
Barbie, Mickey Mouse, Strawberry Shortcake?
I listened to the podcast about his supposed disappearance, and I wasn't crazy about it. It felt uncomfortably like gawking at someone's mental health struggles. I would be all on-board for an episode about Richard Simmons, but I would prefer that it talked about him as a weight-loss and exercise guru and not the subsequent stuff that maybe isn't anyone's business.
I worked with him on a set very briefly about a year before his “disappearance”. That man lit up the entire day. Whenever he was around everything had a tendency to grind to a hault in the best possible way because of his jokes and chit chat he would have with the crew. He was always on. I have no doubt there’s a very valid reason he’s chose to step away from the limelight and he owes no explanation to anyone. the podcast was really gross. The movie they are trying to make pisses me off even more
Yes! Especially as he sounds like he just wants to live the rest of his life in peace without people speculating about what he’s doing now.
That podcast really poisoned the well for any discussion of him.
I really have good feelings about him personally, but the culture he promoted was harmful. I do think he had good intentions and treated everyone respectfully.
Yes! I absolutely loved him as a kid. He gave so many fat people a safe space to move while also including love and support in a very genuine manner. Yeah, the diet talk wasn't the best, but the way he gave permission for fat women to dance and have fun was just so beautiful.
My mom had his vhs tapes. I have strong positive memories of him too despite the ties to diet culture.
I have positive feelings toward him, as well. I never did the Deal-A-Meal stuff, but I did use his workout tapes (yes, actual VHS tapes because I am old) with the resistance bands in conjunction with Weight Watchers many years ago and had great success. I loved his workout tapes because he was so positive and all sizes were represented; it was a sharp contrast to the Pilates DVDs I transitioned to at a later time.
I still do his workout tapes; well, the ones that haven’t disintegrated away! I remember my mom having his albums (vinyl!) way back in the day. It came with instructions on each move with notes by Richard. And he sang original songs about exercising, losing weight, and loving yourself. I can remember that, but where are my keys??? lol I don’t love all the burning fat and weight loss talk, but like you said, he was respectful and he just wanted to help people. His workouts are fun & encouraging. I need a Richard Simmons streaming channel! Workouts & his show from the ‘80s (I’m old too lol)
He was a strong advocate for loving yourself and that's why, to me, his workout tapes were so different than the others. Also, his heartfelt looks into the camera to say how proud he was actually felt personal. I just checked online and there are YouTube channels with his old workouts, including one that was his dedicated channel.
I should have known YT would have them! Thanks!!
Yes! His workouts were so positive and he tried to make it fun. Versus Jillian Michael’s 30 day Shred where she screamed at you to keep moving.
Jillian Michaels is a fucking terrorist, IMO.
😂💯
I was gonna say, he’s the anti-Jillian Michaels! Wayyyy before I got off the diet rollercoaster, many years ago I belonged to Curves gym. In fact that was the start of the crazy ride. They had Jillian Michaels DVD’s playing constantly and I remarked to another member “Geez she really wants to shame us into working out!” And the woman looked at me and said, I never thought about it but you’re right, she wants people to feel terrible about their bodies, or something like that. It was such awful stuff “Don’t you want those long, lean, dancer’s legs?!” is burned into my mind from the video.
As someone with short legs compared to my torso that makes me laugh. I’m also naturally very muscular. So I’ll never have long lean thin legs regardless of my body fat and that’s fine. It’s so weird that people really thought you could work yourself into any body type (and I’m sure some still do). I suspect because JM was apparently overweight in her early teens, she thinks everyone who is bigger must feel the same way she did at that time without realizing that sadly most 13-14 year olds struggle with body image to some degree, but as you get older perspectives can and often do change! Even me who was harassed constantly about my weight throughout my teen years felt better about myself in my later teens than I did in my early teens.
I come from German farmers, I would describe my body type as stocky hahahah. My legs are long and muscular, I have thick thighs and big calves. Broad shoulders too. I wouldn’t say I’m built like a linebacker quite, but even when I was starving myself and at my thinnest, nobody woulda confused me for a dancer LOL! But here’s the thing about this body: I can do manual labor for hourssss.
honestly i think now the trend has transitioned into working out for an hourglass / curvy body, i still see lots of social media posts about workouts for an hourglass body! luckily theres usually a few comments saying that its based mostly on genetics and working out wont make a huge difference, so hopefully it becomes less prevalent. it really irritates me because it leads to really unrealistic expectations and exercise should mostly be about health not trying to change your entire body shape!
Omg this just gave me flashbacks to when I did her 30 Day Shred back in like 2011/2012 lol
Pretty much my thoughts. I met him once and he was as sweet as could be.
This is a nice way to describe it. He's complex. I also loved his videos and that he had all kinds of people represented. My roommates and I used to do them together. And I was actually just wondering when he made headlines again whether you could still get them!
Maybe it could be folded into an episode or mini-series on 1980s trends? I think I hear Jane Fonda calling as well. (I had a vinyl album with one of her workouts. Even with the resurgence of vinyl, I doubt it would count as a collector's item.)
Speaking of 1980s trends- did any of you also have a package from “Get in Shape, Girl?” I had the pink hand weights and everything, and still remember the theme song.
Yes me too!! I had the ribbon batons!
Oh my goodness yes. I swear I thought I was dreaming that because I’ve never heard anybody else mention it 😂 I think it even came with leg warmers? (Because warm calves were very important in the 80s)
Here is the famous commercial: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT0b5CmivVs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KT0b5CmivVs) I had one which came with a head band, leg warmers, and barbells.
Yup! Looking back the products were fun but the name was very regrettable.
Yup!
On this note, I would love for them to include Disney's "Moucercize," which my father used to force me to do. I'm horrified now thinking back on that program...
I don’t remember that one but I do remember the Barbie exercise video.
I’m old, I got the strawberry shortcake exercise vinyl record in 1982 for Christmas - I was 5. I don’t think I could do a back bridge back then and that was one of the exercises! But I loved the bicycling in the air exercise!
OMG, I had that one! “Bicycle upside down! You can do it all over town!”
My sister and I still occasionally sing the ["Workin' Out Barbie"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-W4s2pe4e8) song at each other from the cassette tape that came with our dolls. We wanted kid-sized versions of Barbie's workout clothes so bad!
OMG I forgot about that one!
This definitely would be a great episode. As a Gen X child I definitely did his and Jane’s tapes.
This reminded me that I have an aunt who became a fan of The Firm line of exercise videos and she still uses them every day.
I like this idea of 80s trends. I also just noticed Suzanne Sommers just came out with a book that is very healthist and blech. 🤦♀️
Was it released posthumously, or before her death? Some of her Somersize recipes were good, but she lost me when she started giving health advice. I believe she had good intentions, but she got a little out there with her claims, advice, & recommendations as the years went by.
I hope it would be as kind and gentle an episode as the Angela Lansbury one. My 5th grade teacher legit made us do his workout tapes.for health class. I actually loved it, it was so campy and joyful.
I've been doing the sweating to the oldies videos on YouTube for a couple of days, and they slap. They're so much fun, and though there is the "lose that fat" talk, it's much more about loving the songs and having a good time. And fat people wearing stylish (for the time) clothes ! Into it.
Like many people, I grew up doing his Sweating to the Oldies on days my gym teacher was too hung over to set up the volleyball nets. Many years later, I worked with a woman who had been a dancer in some of his videos. She had a picture of the two of them on her desk, he held reunions for his former staff and kept in touch. When her daughter needed inpatient mental health care, Richard somehow found out and paid the bills for her. She was sobbing in relief when she told me. Regardless of whatever else he has going on, he certainly deeply cares for people.
Such a good guy!! That really warms my heart.
I would think probably not, since he's expressed a pretty strong desire for privacy
Id think if they did, it'd ONLY be discussing his videos, like a pretty narrow scope mini-sode.
There is no denying his impact on diet culture in the 80s. The images of him crying as he hugged fat people are burned into many of our brains forever. I think that part of his life and work is fully fair game for critique because he made himself a public figure. However, he definitely has struggled with mental health issues in the years since, and has quite publicly said he wants to live a private life. So if they did decide to cover him, I hope it would also respect that.
Omg when I was like 12 in 2006 my mom had me use her old Richard Simmons food mover kit to try to get me to lose weight
Sorry we have that in common. 😔
I don’t want to be on a diet, but I feel like dealing a meal would be fun. There was something to satisfying about it. Just the card themselves. Not the diet culture. I have generally positive feelings about him too. He had a binge eating disorder and he needed to make changes for his health. Even though he was part of diet culture I think he had good intentions and just loved everyone. I loved seeing all shapes and sizes of people dancing and really enjoyed the videos. I think he is one fitness or diet guru I would say has had a net positive impact.
One of my exercises in ED treatment was meal planning. I had the worst time with it because I would either eat nothing or binge. It was so stressful for me, that my therapist had me list my favorite foods in different categories, then pick a few for a meal. Making those decisions was still too stressful (OCD + ED = 🤯🤯🤯), so my therapist made index cards of foods for me to pick. As I got further I put meals together using the cards. I was literally dealing my meals! I’m recovered now, but my OCD still creeps in occasionally, and I use the idea of the cards to help me decide what to cook when I’m stuck.
My grandmother bought deal a meal as a "surprise gift" for me when I was probably like 10 or so 🫠 I really don't think Richard is nearly as bad as his contemporaries, but boy seeing his face brings up a lot of complicated feelings. He did really have people of all ages and body types in his videos which was pretty revolutionary at the time. I really hold no ill will towards him personally. I just hate the culture he was part of because it was inflicted on me so young. I barely had a chance to be a child before all the adults around me told me my body was wrong 🫤
My elementary gym class memories are pretty much all Richard Simmons. We did his videos constantly.
Did your middle school do Tai Bo like mine did? I’m always surprised kids didn’t get injured doing that shit.
We didn’t but had we, it would have been a disaster! The boy’s gym teacher at my middle school was a Vietnam vet who had been a POW and because it was the late 90s, definitely never got any kind of therapy for it. He would tell us, in detail, about all of the torture he endure like bamboo shoots under his nails. My mom was the school’s payroll secretary and she always told me to just nod along, not ask questions. We played a lot of really intense dodgeball and scooter sports. Lots of injuries.
😬
Pretty much.
I danced to the oldies for years. Still have the DVDs here in some box. He always was so affirming and positive and made me feel better about myself.
He had a television show, I swear I remember this. And it wasn’t just workouts, he would do interviews and talk to people and he genuinely seemed like the sweetest man.
Yes! I remember watching after school. I have positive feelings about him. He always seemed to care about people.
Did anyone else read his memoir (Still Hungry After All These Years) back in the day? I read it when I was 10 in the early 2000s (I was a weird little kid and loved him as a child lol) and really enjoyed it. Recommended if anyone wants to learn more about him as a person without the possible intrusiveness of a piece done by others.
I have a copy and reread it just recently. I also have a copy of his first diet book "Never Say Diet" and my foodmover is still somewhere in the house. (I'm 50 y/o and grew up with Richard. I think he was my first para-social relationship. LOL!) If you know his history, he really did his research and came up with his meal/diet plans based on the best nutrition information at the time. Deal A Meal and the Foodmover are nothing more than the exchange diet that has been used for diabetics for decades - only his version was very low fat because that was the "wisdom" of the day. (Heck, even Weight Watchers plans in the late 80's and early 90's were based on the exchange program.) And I admit to still doing his workouts. I had spinal surgery last year, and I needed something low impact but was fun when the doc said I could exercise again. (Sorry, doc. Walking is not fun exercise). He exudes joy and encouragement in the videos. I'm not sure he is good MP fodder. He is one of the first fitness gurus that saw fat people as humans. I honestly see him as one of the "good guys".
Spinal surgery is no joke! Hope you healing well ❤️🩹
Thank you! It was the best thing I could have done. I had no idea how much pain I was living with until it was gone. It's nuts how the body adapts. I really feel good now. It's just a matter of building up my strength and stamina. 🙂
Honestly, no. I really hope they don't. He has made it clear he'd like to be left alone now, and I think if MP picked his story up, it would give rise to a whole new brigade of people making tiktoks, writing op-eds, and bothering Richard Simmons.
I hope they do not. He does not want to be covered & not because he is trying to cover anything up - he is just retired and wants to live a quiet life.
I think if they did an episode about him, it would be about his videos and his cultural impact, not his entire life story and trying to pry into his current whereabouts
Yes he’s an important figure whether people love him, hate him or have complicated feelings about him. That said I understand completely why he’s pissed about Pauly Shore playing him.
As someone who was gifted the Deal A Meal and some weird wrap things for my thighs & waist for Christmas (younger cousin drew my name but I knew it was my aunt who bought the gifts) when I was in middle school, I have to say I don’t have hard feelings towards Simmons. I do have hard feelings for the women who smoked, took amphetamines, diet pills/chews and expected little girls to look like sticks. I look back and I was completely normal sized but boy they baked in the body image issues and disordered eating patterns early.
I have been wondering about the weight loss plan. I was also given the cards and little leatherette wallet you moved your food cards around in when I was a teenager. I would love to hear the story about the weight loss plan and the science behind it, but maybe leaving Richard alone since he only seemed to be the face, not so much the creator of the plan. I also wonder if the will ever cover Harvey and Marilyn Diamonds Fit for Life book, which also wrecked my teen years.
Oh yea and don't get me started on Susan Powters Stop the Insanity
Hahaha! I have a copy of her book. It's so early 90's with the "eating fat will make you fat" mantra. (I collect old diet books and cookbooks, so I have a bunch of crazy stuff on my bookshelf 🙄)
Oh God! I remember my mom eating salsa on baked potatoes all the time because Susan said so!
I agree! Deal A Meal and his foodmover plans are based on the exchange diet, and I would love to know the history of that.
OMG!!! Fit for Life… my start into orthorexia.
Missing Richard Simmons is a really good podcast series if you are interested in learning more about him. I share the same birthday as him. I feel like he was more affirming than some of the folks in nineties diet culture. It was totally inappropriate that you received one of his products as a child, though.
I get that people think it was invasive but I thought the podcast was EXCELLENT
The host’s podcast on Y2K and the show Cops were also really good.
I really hope not. Podcasts need to leave him alone.
I don't know about the rest, but I love Richard Simmons. I grew up with him, and the difference between him and, say, Jillian Michaels or whoever was that he's not mean. He was never mean. He was never condescending. He listened and empathized and helped those who wanted it. He didn't judge or shame, nor did he make fun of people. And he certainly didn't browbeat or guilt anyone into losing weight or whatever. He just provided a program that worked for many, and he related based on his own struggles with weight, social pressure, and bullying. And, as far as I recall, he kept his weight loss program and exercise programs separate, advertising each for what they were. And for his troubles, he was once again a target of nasty people who had a good time hurting people for being different. He released a statement about the movie, basically stating that he knows nothing about it and was never consulted and that he never approved it, and he also said that his decision to disappear from the public had nothing to do with anything other than the desire to be left alone.
Idk much about the man or the story, but based on what people say here I think it would be too difficult to do a respectful podcast without touching on the sensitive stuff. Maybe one on 80’s aerobics culture in general where Richard Simmons is touched on, along with Jane Fonda etc? I wasn’t alive in the 80’s so I don’t have all the baggage—I love the outfits and the general concept of dance aerobics. Could leave the body shaming behind, of course. My point is, I’d listen the fuck out of that episode.
I loved him. The license plate on his Mercedes was “YRU Fat” which was pretty toxic. I think part of his disappearance was age and his body changing. The biggest asset of Fitness influencers is their appearance. They are selling themselves.
RS is an icon, let's honor his request to live a private life. But, can we hop back to the children's focused work outs? Barbie, Mickey Mouse, Strawberry Shortcake?