Filmmaker recounts his 30-day McBinge

Where Spurlock's weight ballooned, his liver flabbified to alcoholic levels and his libido went the way of the dodo from eating nothing but McDonald's food for an entire month, Fogle lost weight on his Subway diet, got game, got married and got a sweet gig as Subway's svelte spokesman.


		PAUL JOSEPH BROWN / P-I
	Morgan Spurlock is all smiles as he promotes his film "Super Size Me," but it was a very different picture when he was eating nothing but McDonald's.

This isn't to say that a blotchy, gassy body is all that Spurlock, 33, gained through documenting his hellaciously unhealthy diet. He won a director's prize at this year's Sundance Festival, and his documentary, "Super Size Me" got picked up by Samuel Goldwyn Films. The future looks bright for the slim-again Spurlock. He's even working on a pilot for cable network F/X next fall.

That Spurlock gained 24 pounds in a month on his McBinge isn't surprising. What's surprising -- even to the three doctors he consulted -- was the deterioration of his health. No one expects fast food of any sort to be good for the body, but aren't they just innocuous, empty calories? Apparently not. Watching Spurlock eat a Super Size meal (one of the very few he actually jumboed in the film) we see him sweat, bloat, belch and ultimately vomit out his car window all within about 25 minutes. As his experiment progresses, his body decays before our eyes -- his eyes look cloudy, his skin clammy and greasy. His gut expands.

McDonald's issued a statement saying that Spurlock's monthlong experiment was disingenuous and he stacked the deck to get his grotesque results. He says his choices reflected reality. In town to promote his flick, which opens May 7 at the Uptown and Metro theaters, Spurlock answered our questions at the W Hotel.

Let's start with your diet, just to make sure everyone is caught up on this: You chose to pile about 5,000 calories a day, mostly in fat and sugar into a body that needed about half that amount, correct?

Yeah, it was a little less than that, but on average, about 5,000 calories of mostly fat and sugar because that's what most of their food is.

And while you made sure you only exercised as much as the average person, you ate more fat and calories than average, correct?

Correct. The average American walks about 5,000 steps a day (about 2 1/2 miles) and usually -- I live in New York, so usually I'd be over that. When I left New York it was easy because I was in a car. The whole time we were in Texas, I walked just over a half-mile a day. We were in Texas for three days, and I walked about 4,000 steps in three entire days. So you see the impact that a car culture has on this (obesity) epidemic as well.

OK, so you ate more fast food than the average person, and you exercised less. With all due respect, what the heck did you think would happen to your body?

Well I thought I would gain weight, like the doctors even said. The doctors said, "Yeah, you'll probably gain a little weight." ... Most people know this food is bad for you, what I think most people don't realize is how bad a high-fat, high-sugar, high-calorie diet is for you. And nobody eats three fast food meals a day, of course. ... Here's the question: What would be an acceptable amount of weight to gain in a month then? If I'd gained only 10 pounds a month, would that have been acceptable? ... What I've done in a month is emulate what people do over their entire lives, which is create diets which are toxic to their lifestyles. This diet and the lack of exercise is going to lead to disease to health problems down the road that while you're here in the moment, you're eating this food, you're not foreseeing.

If McDonald's food is so nasty, how do you explain Don Gorske (the Big Mac fanatic who eats over 700 of the double-deckers in one year)?

What you have to realize about Don Gorske is that Don Gorske doesn't eat anything but Big Macs ... 90 percent of his solid food diet comes from Big Macs. He has two big Macs every day. ... In a day, he's probably not even taking in 1,600 calories, and he's a prison guard, so he's burning calories, dealing with a lot of stressful situations.

Have you had any direct contact with the company?

No. They released their statement saying this film is "a super-sized distortion of the choice and possibilities we have on our menu." ... But now, six weeks after the movie premiered at Sundance, they eliminated Super Size options. They just announced last week that they're rolling out the Go Active Happy Meal (which includes a salad, water, pedometer and exercise chart).

Do you feel triumphant about that?

I think that it's fantastic. It's a testament to the power of filmmaking. You know we created a movie that has really fast-forwarded the business practices of a corporation. Did this film have any impact on their decisions? They (McDonald's) said that this has nothing to do with that movie whatsoever ... maybe they had been talking about this before. Did the film put this (the healthier menu options) into work more quickly? Absolutely. ... Look when they're rolling out the Go Active Happy Meal. When are they launching it? May 6. When does our movie open? May 7.

Did you interview any parents about the sad state of school lunches?

We did talk to some parents and in terms of the pacing of the film; there were things that didn't work. But of everything we talk about in the movie, the school lunches are by far the most horrendous thing that's happening right now. We have school lunches that are filled with junk food, filled with fast food and this is what we're feeding our kids. And I love that some school officials say, "Well some of these kids get only one meal a day," and it's like, oh, so this is the one meal we'll give them. Let's give them pizza or ice cream and slushies and Ding Dongs -- it's great.

Surely not all these kids come from troubled homes ... but it seems as though even the kids who bring packed lunches from home are bringing junk. At what point should the parent take responsibility?

A parent has to take responsibility from the minute they have a kid. I grew up in a house where my mom cooked dinner every day. A lot of my food education happened at that table. Parents need to realize that food education starts with them -- they are the role model for this kid from a very young age. You have to set an example of a proper dietary lifestyle and it's not happening ... we have to not buy into the idea of "I don't have time for this." (Former) Surgeon General (David) Satcher said, "If you don't make time to take care of yourself now, you'd better make time to be in hospitals later," and no truer words have been spoken.

Critics of the documentary point to some of your previous work, such as MTV's "I Bet You Will," (where people were essentially offered money to do gross things) and say that "Super Size Me" is the ultimate bet -- eat fast food for a month and make money off the stunt.

The people who are throwing out this spin are all lobby groups who are funded by corporations whose job it is to do everything they can to discredit this film. You know, we created a show for MTV and we've taken the money from that and made this film that is having a very positive effect.

You looked concerned about your health at certain points during the experiment. Did you seriously consider quitting?

By day 21, when I was really sick -- I woke up in the middle of the night with heart palpitations, chest pains, I couldn't breathe and that was scary. I went to the doctors and all three doctors said stop, my girlfriend is saying stop, I also call my mom, my dad ... and everyone says, "Quit. You don't need to show anything else." It was my oldest brother, the beacon of wisdom that he is ... the guy who says "No, no, jump off the roof, it'll be fine," you know, that guy. I call him ... and in his great Southern accent he says, "Morgan, people eat this ...their whole lives. You think it's gonna kill you in nine more days?" ... And I'm so glad that I didn't quit because what happens at the end is very telling ... my cholesterol starts to get better, my liver function starts to get a little better and all my numbers start to come down and what's happening is that my body is adapting ... and this is how our bodies have adjusted to this constant torture of high-fat, high-sugar diets with no exercise.

Do you think that your documentary can fuel the American tendency toward victimization and litigiousness?

I don't think so. I wanted to make a film that wasn't preachy. As much as people think the film attacks McDonald's, I don't think that it attacks McDonald's. The film is an attack of the fast-food culture that we live in and this environment that is completely sedentary ... and what I hope comes from the film is that people will walk out of the movie not looking to point blame, but they come out wanting to examine how they live their life. ... I hope parents come out of this movie and are upset, and go to the schools and go, "What are you feeding my kids?" and I hope it really lights a fire for them to change the way things are operating in the schools and in the county education systems.

Ultimately, do you believe that corporate responsibility trumps personal responsibility?

I believe that they do go hand-in-hand. I think that preaching corporate responsibility but then advertising to kids from an early age when they're 2-years-old and they do studies and show that advertising to kids at a young age you can win over consumers. The clown isn't the spokesperson for me and you. They don't give away toys for me and you. They don't have playgrounds for me and you. The conditioning that goes on at such a young age, I think really shows the level of corporate responsibility is twisted in a way that you have to question what's happening. ... But, once again, personal responsibility, that role model, has to come from parents.

FAST FACTS

Last year, researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill found:

In 1977, the average fast-food hamburger weighed 5.7 ounces; in 1996, the average hamburger was 7 ounces, with 100 extra calories. Hamburgers at non-fast-food establishments are now smaller.

Sodas went from an average serving of 13 ounces to about 20 ounces.

McDonald's medium fries have 450 calories and 22 grams of fat -- the Super Size French Fries have 610 calories and 29 grams of fat.

Homemade portions of most foods also have increased in size, with the average American eating 50 to 100 more calories per serving of each food (or upward of 500 additional calories each day) in 1996 versus 1977.

Candy bars and snack foods also have been "super-sized," with even the smallest packages of some including more than one serving. Most consumers, however, equate one package with one serving.

P-I reporter D. Parvaz can be reached at 206-448-8095 or dparvaz@seattlepi.com.

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