How Jim Gaffigan Lost Weight
FROM THE MOMENT Jim Gaffigan reaches out to shake my hand, I sense that he’s not sure he belongs here.
We’re on the 16th floor of Hearst Tower, where Men’s Health is painstakingly and lovingly produced and where Gaffigan is set to be photographed. Even though he and I are wearing the exact same outfit—what I’ve come to lovingly call the “big guy’s best friend,” a black T-shirt, black pants, and white sneakers—Gaffigan isn’t a big guy anymore.
“I think I’m a better fit for Men’s Antihealth,” he says to a room of people too busy to laugh. Gaffigan’s weight loss was a shift, not just visually but comedically. If you know his work, you know a sizable portion of his comedy centers on food—particularly food that’s not great for you.
In stand-up routines, he’s unpacked the shame of going to McDonald’s, the grotesque joy of Waffle House, and (perhaps most famously) the ultra-processed wonder that is a Hot Pocket. Gaffigan has gone down two pants sizes since then. He’s turned from Dad Is Fat (his 2013 New York Times best seller) into Slim Jim.
On November 22, Gaffigan’s newest stand-up special, The Skinny, launches on Hulu. During the first ten minutes of the show, the comedian addresses his new look. There’s one bit I ask him about, a joke in which he admits to the audience that even after his weight loss, he’s still inclined to keep his “fat clothes.” Gaffigan tells me, “Maybe I’m a pack rat, but I’m like, I can’t get rid of that. And then there is something about the haunting,” he says, raising his hands up like he’s telling a ghost story. “They’re like, You’re going to wear me again.”
Later in The Skinny, he jokes, “I’m trying to enjoy being thin, because I know I’m going to be fat again. This is not sustainable.” The crowd applauds, as if to signal they’re thrilled that Fat Jim is still in there somewhere. There’s a legacy of big men in comedy, after all: John Belushi, John Candy, Chris Farley, Kevin James. But what happens when you’re a big guy making jokes about yourself and you’re no longer big?
“People used to always say, ‘If you lost weight, you’d lose your whole act,’ ” Gaffigan says. “It’s so strange, because in some ways, we’re not the funny big guy, are we? That’s the role that I’m supposed to play. But also in some ways, that may be the avenue of our warmth.”
Except that it’s not just comedy that’s changing. Our attitudes toward weight are, too. (For one, Chris Farley’s “Fat guy in a little coat” from 1995’s Tommy Boy doesn’t quite hit the same way in 2024.) In The Skinny, Gaffigan jokes, “We live in this age of body positivity, beauty comes in all shapes and sizes,” then delivers the punchline that appetite suppressants have the same people saying, “Give it to me or I’ll kill you.”
It’s here, amid the contradictions of what we say we value and what we really value, of what we say we want and what we really want, that Gaffigan is planting his flag. But still, the question: Is it funny?
Some people know this, but Gaffigan used to be an athlete. In college, he was an offensive guard and tackle for Georgetown. “I had a lifetime of working out constantly, [especially in] my 20s. I was really thin, but I was working out twice a day, running six miles and then doing a spinning class at night.” It wasn’t until his late 20s and into his 30s, when Gaffigan began pursuing comedy in earnest, that his slowing metabolism met N.Y.C. bars and late-night eating.
In the era of overnight Hollywood weight loss, Gaffigan offers the secret to his recent success without even taking a beat. “Mounjaro,” he says, before I can finish asking if he’s had experience with weight-loss drugs. He mentions the drug in The Skinny, too: Weight-loss drugs aren’t “cheating,” he says. “I’m just a fat guy trying to not die.”
About two years ago, Gaffigan’s doctor suggested he try the appetite suppressant, initially developed for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Medications like tirzepatide (the active ingredient in Mounjaro) and semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy) have shown potential to help manage cholesterol, heart disease, and chronic weight issues. Drugs like these could be game changers, especially for people like Gaffigan, who says his impulsivity issues are often at the root of his eating habit, as was the case with the rest of his family while he was growing up.
Jim Gaffigan in January 2020, before his weight-loss transformation.
“Most of our lives we’ve been told, Just control your appetite. Just stop being a fucking pig,” he says. “The reality is, we can’t. Maybe our brains are a little wonky or whatever. I think that in some ways, the appetite suppressants are this justification for people who have compulsive eating, that they’re not weak—that some of it can be fixed.”
Taking Mounjaro isn’t the only thing Gaffigan has done for his health, either. He went on a keto-esque diet (very low carb) and later added intermittent fasting. And then there are the eggplants.
Over the summer, Gaffigan picked up another healthy habit that amazes even him: gardening. His Instagram is dotted with photos of the season’s crop: squash, corn, beans, cucumbers, shishito peppers, and (with obligatory dick joke) eggplants. “Growing vegetables makes you more interested in consuming those vegetables, which makes you healthier, which makes you kind of look at what you’re consuming, which makes fast food look like the crap that it is.”
The yardwork also helps him hit daily fitness goals. “I’m not saying that I’m doing the work of a farmer, but . . . you can do some work out there.” And, at 58, when the windows for exercise are barely cracked open (touring, parenting five kids), he understands his limitations.
So if gardening is the primary exercise Gaffigan can get now, he’ll take it. He’s realistic about food, too. On the far side of the interview room, there’s a buffet with an assortment of turkey sandwiches, chicken wraps, pesto pasta, thumbprint cookies, and rugelach. Gaffigan and I have both eyed it through the course of our interview.
“I have friends that would take this stuff and put it in to-go containers, but I’m not at that level. But if it’s free, what are we, stupid here?”
And that’s where Gaffigan, who will go on tour with Jerry Seinfeld in 2025, has found the funny: not in the weight loss itself but rather in all the conflict—about the “right” way to lose weight, hanging on to old clothes, or a guy who used to eat at Waffle House but now respects eggplant. This stuff is complicated, but Gaffigan is here to laugh through all the shifting, complex, and wild weirdness of losing weight in the Ozempic age.
“Maybe this section [of the interview] should be Men’s Unhealth because . . . I mean, I do intermittent fasting, but there’s still pesto pasta there,” Gaffigan says of the buffet spread. “I’m finding it hard to resist.” Instead, he chooses a turkey sandwich.
GET JIM’S LEAD LOOK: Banana Republic shirt.
Food styling: Victoria Granof/2D Creative.
Prop styling: Michael Sturgeon/Monday Artists and Ryan Schaefer.
Styling: Ted Stafford.
Grooming: Melissa DeZarate/A Frame.
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