Marlon Brando is the ultimate Hollywood bad guy. During his half-century as one of the finest actors of all time, he has devoted a truly heroic amount of time to not giving a damn.
He is regarded as one of the most admired actors in film history and was described by Marilyn Monroe as “the sexiest man” she had ever seen. And you can see an almost-perfectly proportioned, sleek-looking, brilliant actor in his early, fantastic films such as “On the Waterfront” (1954), “Streetcar Named Desire” (1951), “The Men” (1950), and “Guys and Dolls” (1955).
But even in the early days of his film career, Marlon Brando enjoyed his food. No, scratch that. Consider Brando’s approach toward food, for example, how unconcerned he was about what other people thought of him.
Marlon Brando’s fans are generally aware that the actor became quite overweight in his final years. They thought that their 5’11 tall idol just gained 350 pounds because of old age. But was that the reason? Generally, only a few are aware of Marlon Brando’s bizarre eating habits.
Marlon Brando’s second wife once put a lock on the couple’s refrigerator. Marlon Brando smashed it with a crowbar and ate a massive chunk of a comically large wheel of cheese because, middle finger you, he was hangry!
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to grease. When another of Marlon Brando’s girlfriends pushed him to go on a diet a few years ago, he went through with it during the day and then had his pal’s fling bags of Burger King over his fence at night for him to eat.
Marlon Brando’s girlfriend waited months, and Marlon still wasn’t losing weight. She then realized that Brando was sneaking out at 2 a.m., munching on A good number of Whooper wrappers.
Marlon Brando would sit on set between takes and eat entire roast chickens even before his weight gain, and he would wander off when he wasn’t needed to find something to eat. It got to the point where studios had to send employees to physically bring Brando back to the set because if they didn’t, he’d gorge himself on fatty food and then pass out. Isn’t that insane enough for you?
Well, not for Marlon Brando. That’s nothing to him. His favourite was binging on ice cream.
Marlon Brando was well aware that there was something special about ice cream. During the film “Mutiny on the Bounty,” he split 52 pairs of tight-fitting breaches due to ice cream (1962). Brando would go out to the lake alone in a canoe, sometimes with a container of ice cream, in the middle of breakfast or lunch, or even when they were filming, and chat to the birds.
Although Brando’s odd eating habits and binges were peculiar. He had already developed unusual eating habits as an adolescent at a Minnesota Military Academy. He would go on binges, slathering pieces of bread with peanut butter and gulping down a quart of milk. Despite this, he said that he converted fat to muscle through challenging exercise, climbing ropes without using his feet, and swimming for the swim team.
Marlon’s diet consisted primarily of “junk food, takeout, and peanut butter,” which he ingested by the jarful. Marlon Brando was also known for eating boxes of Mallomars and cinnamon buns and washing them down with a quart of milk by the mid-1950s.
Marlon Brando used to go on crash diets in the 1950s and 1960s, but he would binge. He lived on raw veggies and jogged down Waikiki Beach for the film “Sayonara,” only to be found devouring a breakfast of corn flakes one morning. With bananas and cream, scrambled eggs, sausages and bacon, and a giant stack of pancakes drenched with butter and maple syrup.
According to Marlon Brando’s co-star, Karl Malden, Marlon Brando would have potatoes, two steaks, two apple pies a la mode. And a whole quart of milk for dinner while filming “One-Eyed Jacks.” Because of his diet, he had to change his clothes regularly. The staff handed Marlon a cowboy belt as a present for his birthday party that year, with the note, “Hope it fits.”
Marlon’s double had to be employed in long shots on the set of “The Appaloosa” (1966) since Marlon had eaten one of his lunches. Marlon would devour two chickens at a sitting and bags of Pepperidge Farm cookies while joking about the added poundage.
Marlon Brando’s second wife, Movita, also mentioned how he frequently drove down to hot dog shops late at night. He would pay a visit to one of his favourite Hot Dogs stalls. Conveniently, the stall was open 24 hours a day, and Brando would go at 3:00 or 4:00 a.m. and devour a half-dozen hot dogs at a time until morning.
During the Missouri Breaks (1976) filming, it was alleged that the ecologically conscious Marlon Brando plucked a frog out of a pond. And devoured the unfortunate amphibian, then dropped it back into the water. At this point, people were generally concerned about his eating habits because it was already strange, to begin with. But even more bizarre by heaping a live harmless frog off a pond only to devour it.
Later in the 1980s, Marlon was frequently seen buying five-gallon containers of ice cream from a Beverly Hills ice cream parlour. He also admitted eating it all by himself and mixing it with a pound of fried bacon stuffed within an entire loaf of bread.
Suppose you’re wondering how Marlon Brando avoided being fired or smacked in the face for his actions and constant weight gain. In that case, it’s because he was such a talented actor. Marlon Brando was one of Hollywood’s most sought-after men in the 1960s, and you can guarantee he took advantage of his celebrity status when Marlon Brando wasn’t having any ham during the “Mutiny on the Bounty” production. He’d spend his time being a gigantic dick if he didn’t have any food.
Marlon Brando would be late every day, refuse to say the words handed to him, and then demand rewrites in the middle of scenes. When rewrites were not possible, Marlon Brando would make up his lines.
You:
This is more amusing given Brando’s aversion to memorizing lines, preferring instead to have them scribbled on cue cards or, in certain circumstances, by other actors in the scene. When the director inquired what he could do to make Brando do his job. The actor paused for a bit before asking if the filmmaker could connect the lines. But there’s a catch: connect the cables to a nude ass of an actress he was attracted to. And shake that ass with some food.
Also, when Marlon Brando was cast as Jor-El in Superman, he told the director that a sizeable green CGI bagel should have played his part. A request that was only granted after the director personally pleaded to Marlon Brando, explaining that Superman’s father was never a bagel in the comics.
With that said, Marlon Brando’s relationship with food was one peculiar one. When Marlon Brando turned 80, he did make a last-ditch attempt to lose weight by going on a bland diet near the end of his life, when he was clearly in danger due to his overeating.
He lost 70 pounds at one point and drastically reduced his eating habits by maintaining a bland diet. However, his overeating habits and repeated crash diets had already seriously harmed his heart, liver, and body in general.
