Interview w/Morgan Spurlock: Super Size Me

Motherjones.com:What inspired you to make Super Size Me [the film]?
Morgan Spurlock: Well, for me it was really inspired by the lawsuits [brought by two obese girls against McDonald’s for making them fat]. But what really did it for me was in 2002, at Thanksgiving, you couldn’t open a magazine or turn on the TV without hearing about the obesity epidemic in America, and everyone always singled out fast food as a big problem in the epidemic. People were always pointing the finger at the fast food industry. And I was a big fan of personal responsibility -- you know, no one is forcing you to eat. We’re not geese being stuffed with corn.
But the more I started to hear about the lawsuits, I started to say, “Well, there’s something here. There’s something in the marketing, the advertising campaigns. The content of the food is something they really don’t make known, how much fat and sugar is in [the food] you’re eating. There’s definitely a side to this I can understand. For me, I was sitting on the couch watching a television program, and I can’t remember if it was someone from McDonald’s or someone from the food company, but they’ve got a lobbyist who came on and said, “You can’t link our food to these two girls getting sick. You can’t link our food to these girls being obese. Our food is healthy; it’s nutritious; it’s good for you.” And I thought, if it’s that good for me, then I should be able to eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for thirty days straight and be fine.
MJ.com: So on about day 22—
MS: I was so sick and so unhappy.
MJ.com: Did you consider stopping?
MS: Yeah, that day when all three doctors, my nutritionist, my girlfriend, and everyone [said], “You proved your point. Enough’s enough. You’ve got to stop now,” because the doctors didn’t know what was going to happen. They said they didn’t think I should’ve ever done this. “We don’t know what could be next, you need to stop.” It got very, very scary there for a while. But I decided to persevere. I called countless people. I called my parents. I called other doctor-friends of mine, and all of them were like “You should quit, you should quit.” But when I called my brother he gave the most sound advice of all. He said, “You know, Morgan, people eat this stuff their whole lives. You think you’re going to die in nine days?” I thought, that’s a very valid point, and pressed on.
MJ.com: You were back to your normal health after a month or so—
MS: Two months.
MJ.com: Have you been to McDonald’s since then?
MS: No. Nuh-uh.
MJ.com: Do you think you’ll ever eat at McDonald’s again?
MS: Well, in the movie, the doctors say you should eat McDonald’s about once a month at most. So based on that I ate enough McDonald’s in the course of a month to last me for eight years. So maybe in eight years.