Anne Hathaway adopted a raw vegan diet to get into character for her latest role in the upcoming AppleTV+ series WeCrashed.
To imitate the lifestyle of Rebekah Neumann, the wife of WeWork founder Adam Neumann, Hathaway became a raw vegan, meaning she cut out all foods of animal origin and only ate foods that were raw or cooked at temperatures below 40-48°C.
“I became a raw vegan,” the Academy Award winner, 39, revealed during an interview on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert on Tuesday, explaining that “Rebekah is a very passionate vegan.”
Laughing off Colbert’s comment about the “roughage” involved, Hathaway shared that while filming she became “so deep in my character” that she considered making the plant-based diet permanent.
“‘I think I’m a vegan now,'” she remembered thinking. “Like, ‘I think this is it … I know I’ve done it before and I know it’s never stuck but I think this is the time that I’m doing it.”
She also told Colbert how her husband Adam Shulman supported the decision — but didn’t judge when her attempts at making the dietary switch permanent fell short.
“And then three weeks later when I was like ‘I need a burger,’ he was like ‘OK,'” laughed Hathaway, who also practiced yoga for the role.
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Though the Devil Wears Prada star is back to eating meat — “we’re all people,” she told Colbert of sampling antelope while visiting Texas last weekend — the vegan diet is one she stands by in theory.
“It’s great,” she said. “And we should do as much as we can to eat vegetables for the environment”
The actress also explained why, as a mom of two little boys, she didn’t “really go as immersive as I did before I had kids” in terms of preparing for her role.
She didn’t want to become so caught up in the character that it affected her time with 5-year-old Jonathan and 2-year-old Jack.
“Yeah, I mean, my kids love me, and I’m sure on some level, care about what I do, but also, like, just want their mom,” shared Hathaway.
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