Kirstie Alley Is Large and in Charge on New Show

March 8, 2005 — -- Kirstie Alley is back in a big way, taking on her much-publicized weight gain in her new television series, "Fat Actress."

The former "Cheers" star has weighed as much as 203 pounds and was featured on the cover of tabloid magazines in unflattering candid shots, including scarfing down fast food in a restaurant parking lot.

Now, she is the Jenny Craig spokeswoman and has dropped about 20 pounds, and her new show, which premiered Monday night on Showtime, is getting a lot of attention.

Alley sat down with "Good Morning America's" Diane Sawyer to talk about the irreverent comedy, in which she names working actors who are "fatter" than her -- including "Sopranos" star James Gandolfini -- and says that she wants to date black men because they like larger women.

"Fat Actress" has been compared to Larry David's HBO comedy, "Curb Your Enthusiasm," in its blurring of the real and fictional lives of its main characters and its willingness to poke fun at Hollywood.

In a scene in the first episode, Alley is sitting in her car voraciously eating a burger and talking on the cell phone to a television executive about getting a new show. The executive tells her that if she wants to get a show, she needs to lose weight first.

Alley shoots back: "I mean, look, John Goodman's got his own show. And Jason Alexander looks like a freakin' bowling ball. And how about James Gandolfino [sic]? He's like the size of a whale. He's way, way, way fatter than I am!"

On the show, Alley also has a romantic encounter with a black man, and in real life she has said that black men are more forgiving about women's weight.

"They like it," she told Sawyer. "Did you hear Jamie Foxx's interview? Yesterday, I just heard Jamie Foxx's interview and they said, 'What kind of body do you like?' And he goes, 'Well, you know, meat, weight, thickness.' I'm like, yeah! So maybe I'll have an affair with Jamie Foxx."

While much of the show focuses on Alley's struggle with her weight, she says she is less hung up on the subject than the public seems to be.