Anne Hathaway Cites Pregnancy Concerns for Skipping 'Hot Ones' Promotion
The actress revealed doctor's orders prevented her from participating in the spicy wing challenge to promote her new film 'Verity'.
Actress Anne Hathaway has explained why she was unable to appear on the popular YouTube show "Hot Ones" to promote her upcoming film "Verity," despite her character engaging in the challenge within the movie.
Hathaway, currently expecting her third child, shared on the "Talk of the Townsends" podcast that her doctor advised her against consuming increasingly spicy chicken wings due to her pregnancy. The show's format involves guests answering questions while eating progressively hotter wings, a challenge Hathaway felt would have been a fitting promotional opportunity.
"I got pregnant, and my doctor said I couldn't do it because I might go into early labor," Hathaway stated. She indicated that she has not yet completed the "10-piece gauntlet" and is unsure when it might occur, suggesting it could happen next year after she gives birth.
According to Healthline, consuming spicy foods has been linked to triggering labor in late-stage pregnancies.
Hathaway, who is also mother to sons Jonathan, 10, and Jack, six, with husband Adam Shulman, 45, noted that there was a significant discussion about whether she would consume the spicy wings during the filming of "Verity." She mentioned that she had switched to "dummy wings" after eating the first three for real during production.
She expressed a desire to experience significant events authentically, stating, "You don't want your first kiss ever in your life to be like an on-screen kiss... You want that to be, like, a real thing where you're not playing a character at the same time as experiencing something physically."
Hathaway proposed her character's appearance on "Hot Ones" in the film as a way to establish Verity's cultural relevance. "Because in my head, if we could do something like, I don't know, get a Gayle King interview and Hot Ones, that would be kind of the triple crown trifecta," she explained during a production meeting.
"Verity," based on Colleen Hoover's 2018 novel, stars Hathaway as the title character who is incapacitated after a car accident. The plot follows Lowen Ashleigh (Dakota Johnson), who is hired to ghostwrite for Verity Crawford (Hathaway). Ashleigh uncovers what appear to be Verity's autobiographical notes, leading her to question the confessions about Verity's husband (Josh Hartnett) and struggle with distinguishing fiction from reality. The film is scheduled for release on October 2.