What do people think of Body Gossip? 

Thereare so many benefits of holding a Body Gossip event at your University. Here is what students at Bath Spa University had to say after their Body Gossip event:

The Participants

Sarah Fullagar (Production Team)

“Being involved in Body Gossip was a fantastic experience. Being a part of the production team allowed me to gain further insight into exactly what it takes to produce a successful show. Seeing the project develop over a 5 month period was extremely exciting, especially as more and more people came on board. Seeing how committed and enthusiastic the whole team, (production, writers, actors and musicians) were enhanced my enjoyment of the whole process.  As well as my involvement behind the scenes, I also participated as a writer. Having the chance to express myself so honestly was a wonderful experience, and seeing how respectfully this material was handled by the team of actors was highly touching. Due to the nature of the campaign, the company were instantly generous, cohesive and dedicated and the whole process was a joy to be a part of.” 

Samuel Bird (Musician)

“As a musician for Body Gossip I had the pleasure of seeing the whole event from a different angle. Before and after the performance we would be playing, and we could see everybody mulling around and getting involved. As for the performance? Just incredible. I've never been so convinced of emotion before and I was blown away. It was great to see a group of people so passionate about something so overlooked, and being able to start promoting the awareness it needs. It was an honour to be involved, and I hope it will happen again in the future on a bigger scale to reach more people and more people.”                                                                                                               

Jess Clayton (Musician)

“Firstly I loved it! Being an ex drama student myself it was so exciting to come back to that, and the relaxed atmosphere and intimate stage setting made me feel so involved in each of the character's stories.


As a musician, it was lovely to be able to do an acoustic set for once and it actually be completely acoustic, nothing plugged in! I felt quite privileged to be singing all my own songs and felt like they fitted in with the evening too. Plus, the opportunity to be able to play my own stuff was fantastic!



Body Gossip was such a great thing to be involved with on so many levels. I feel like I had an insight into so many people's heads that I otherwise wouldn't have and had my heart broke for them, even moved to tears at some points. Thank you for involving me!”                                                                  

Francesca Woods (Actor)

“Media’s influence on projecting this non- realistic view of ‘beauty’ to the world is detrimental. It has been something I have felt very passionately against for many years now but it is also something, like everyone, that I get caught up in myself. Averts, posters and magazines feed our sub-conscious lies about how we should look and I am very aware of how damaging that is. Hearing about Body Gossip and how it promotes healthy body image made me instantly want to be involved. As media does have a substantial say in society, Body Gossip brings the opportunity to use that and challenge that, through its public performance of true body stories. As a training actor, theatre like Body Gossip confirms my personal reasoning for why I want to be an actor; to challenge people on what they think is ‘right or wrong’ and to simply be honest. Being involved in Body Gossip has allowed me do the theatre I want to do. I feel I have gained so much from reading the stories written by my fellow students. In my experience body ‘hang-ups’ can seem quite a lonely thing where everyone else seems confident in their body, but we all feel these feelings and that should be embraced.  I loved every part of Body Gossip Bath and I say, spread the body gossip!”                                            

Elspeth NcNeil (Actor)

“As a training actor Body Gossip was a brilliant experience for me because not only did I have to learn a lot of lines, but more so, these words were written by someone else who could have been sitting in the audience watching, so there was that added pressure to make sure you did their piece justice. All of the pieces were very personal and meaningful to the writers who had used them as a means to convey what they had been through, so I wanted to make sure that I honoured that by doing the best I could in my performance. Participating in Body Gossip was also incredibly full-filling on a more individual level though; I have never personally suffered from an eating disorder or comfort eating, however there are a lot of people who I know and love that have been afflicted with this terrible disease so being able to participate in something which raises awareness of this was brilliant. Moreover, previously I had thought that I was quite well-informed about eating disorders and that I probably wouldn't learn anything new, but this was very ignorant of me because having been involved with Body Gossip, I've come to realise there is always more to learn and it truly re-iterated to me that suffering from Anorexia or Bulimia is an actual medical disease of the mind which needs to be treated and respected in the same was as any other illness. If I had the opportunity again, I would definitely get involved with Body Gossip because it is a fabulous, life-affirming campaign to be involved with!”                                                                                                                            

Emily Miller (Actor)

“I guess for me Body Gossip is a fantastic a way of shining a light of reality about body image and what that can mean to individuals, into the world. As someone who has a very close friend who has suffered from an eating disorder for 14 years, it makes me very angry that people are not willing to openly discuss "difficult" subjects such as negative body image and its consequences. Body Gossip is showing the truth about how people really feel about their bodies and i think this is BRILLIANT! As an actor, I felt very privileged to be working with people’s personal stories and felt incredibly inspired by their honesty and courage. I feel very lucky to have been part of such an amazing project!”             

Claire Rowbotham (Actor)

“From participating as an actor in Bath Spa Body Gossip, I learnt a lot about myself and also about body image in general.                                                                                                                

The first thing I was asked to do was to read through scripts written by other students, and even from this alone I was shocked to find out how many other people worried about their bodies! Some people had different body issues to me, and some more extreme, but as a whole I found it weirdly reassuring to know that I wasn’t the only one, even at my university, to not be 100% happy about how they looked. I learnt that nobody is actually perfect and that ultimately I should stop worrying about my tiny flaws. Because flaws that others had pointed out about themselves, I didn’t even notice; so I assumed the same must apply to me! So already, just from reading the scripts I felt better about myself.

I don’t know how the writers felt when finishing their scripts, but as a performer I found my monologue a very beneficial way of expressing myself and portraying someone else’s feelings. I also thought it was brilliant training for me as the emotions involved were very real and relevant to life today. It felt good to rant and rave about what I was unhappy with and it made me wish that in general people spoke more openly about the subject as I think it would be a healthy thing for everyone to do. It may sound like the whole ordeal was very serious, but in fact it wasn’t…I had so much fun rehearsing and putting on the show and I met so many lovely new people. It is an experience that I think everyone should have if possible and I am so so glad  I was involved with the project. I was very sad when it ended.

So as well as the project making me feel better, training me, giving me the chance to have fun and meet new people….it also reiterated in my mind how important it is for people to have support regarding body issues, if there is no awareness or openness, suffering alone with body image can lead you to a very dark place.

Several audience members came to me after the show in tears saying that they could really relate to the pieces and that they finally felt they could express themselves because of the show. This to me was the most rewarding part of the whole experience, touching people’s hearts and letting them know that they aren’t alone.”                                                                                                       

Megan Harris (Actor)

“Body Gossip made me realise that no matter how beautiful or perfect someone looks to you, they will always find something wrong with themselves. And that imperfections are not wrong or bad, they are unique and make each person an individual. These quirks should be celebrated and everybody should be told how beautiful there are whether they are tall, short, curvy, thin, blonde or brunette.  I chose to get involved because I have had very close friends that were and had suffered massively from feeling bad about their bodies and I realised that Body Gossip could stop people from feeling like this about themselves. It could give someone the chance to realise that they are never alone and that they are beautiful and should never ever doubt that.  Seeing the other girls perform the pieces was very emotional. In some cases it was hard to hear that people who had nothing to worry about felt bad about the way they looked and in other cases it was inspirational to hear how people had recovered and beaten eating disorders!”                                   

 Sammy McDonagh (Actor)

“When I was first told about the organisation and the event being planned at the University it immediately caught my attention and I wanted to be involved. It had such a different approach to dealing with the issues surrounding body image. Knowing that individuals from the university had written the pieces made the writing even more poignant as they were real words about real experiences. I learnt so much from watching the performances (and from being involved in performing myself) about the range of issues surrounding body image and the different viewpoints on it. I was suprised to learn that this was the first student event as the subject matter can be so incredibly pertinent to young people being thrown into a new environment such as university, hopefully this was the first of many! I am so grateful that I was able to be a part of a project that not only helped to increase awareness for the charities BEAT and the National Osteoporosis Society but also increased my own awareness of body image from a whole wealth of people.”

The audience

Louise Leftwich (Writer and audience member)

“Well Done to everyone tonight, you were all so beautiful and brilliant.”

Alison Knight (Writer and audience member)

“Thank you Body Gossip Bath. It was a professional, emotional and inspiring evening. You did us all proud.”

Ruth Rogers (Founder of Body Gossip and audience member)

“Absolutely gobsmacked by tonight - the writing was so articulate, the performances so detailed and as for Team Body Gossip Bath. Legends the lot of you! Thanks for an unforgettable night and here's to the future!”

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