Although his television exposure has picked up considerably as of late, you have probably seen a lot less of actor/comedian and St. Louis native Gary “GThang” Johnson. About 70 pounds less.
“I got tired of going in for the same old character roles; the security guard, the fat lover, the dude who is eating the sandwich while he is waiting on the train,” Johnson said.
“No doctor told me that I needed to lose weight. There was no health scare or anything like that. To be honest, I went in to prove a point to somebody that I can do it for myself and I wanted to go in for more leading man roles.”
Health-wise, Johnson was lucky. He initially weighed 267 pounds on his 5’10-1/2’ frame. By taking action to get the weight off, he dodged many diseases that obesity puts so many persons at greater risk, like diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, breathing problems, breast, prostate, colon cancers and even an early grave.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports a dramatic increase in obesity with more than one-third of U.S. adults (35.7%) and approximately 17% (or 12.5 million) of children and adolescents aged 2 -19 years being considered obese.
About 97 million adults in the United States are overweight or obese, according to The National Health Lung and Blood Institute. Women with waistlines greater than 35 inches and men with waist circumferences greater than 40 inches are at higher risk for a number of diseases because of the excess abdominal fat.
“I got to a point when I went from a 44 to a 34 in the waist,” he said. “Yeah – it’s not a game. I was excited … I was able to order clothes out of the magazines then. It wasn’t no, ‘let me get that 2X or 3X; let me get that large, that will fit right or let me get that slim fit.”
Johnson’s daily regimen over the past two-and-a-half years added the exercise while he also scraped unhealthy food off his plate.
“I do 300 sit ups, pushups/pull-ups a day. I do maybe 3 ½ miles a day walking and running.
After I do the cardio, then I start doing all the sit-ups, pushups, and pull-ups. And if you do that, you tone up your whole body,” Johnson said.
Additionally, he said some people think you can just exercise like that, then go home, and “eat a whole hog.”
“You can’t do that,” Johnson reminded. “I cut out all the meat. I eat fish, but I cut out all the meat, all the starchy foods’ all the breads, no salt. And no sodas, no juices. Now I do juice sometimes but no pure orange juice and stuff like that with all that acid in it. Not only does it make you feel better and look better, it makes your skin beautiful too.”
He also drinks a lot of water.
Johnson said repetition and consistency is the key to getting results via exercise, rather than lifting heavy weights.
“A lot of people think they need people to work out with. You don’t. You can do it on your own. Use your own motivation,” Johnson said. “You’ve got to trick your mind in order to work out.”
He said all those compliments at the comedy clubs keep his mind in trick mode to further his acting career.
“I want to be able to take the shirt off; that was my goal, to get to that point,” he said.
“Overall, it makes you feel better and you are not breathing heavily.”
Johnson’s metamorphosis into a healthy body continues to bring in desired results with the ladies and for quality screen time.
“I’m doing a movie right now with Jamie Kennedy where I play an undercover detective, and where I am playing a model in one of them, because we go to break up a sex ring,” he said. “And then I’m doing another show; it’s about rules of engagement, where they are going to have a handsome guy talk about relationships.”
Johnson recently made guest appearances on the Arsenio Hall Show, Tom Joiner Morning Show radio program and “The Real Husbands of Hollywood. Three weeks ago, Johnson returned to St. Louis to launch the multi-city promotional tour of his upcoming television special, “I’m Almost Famous,” to include a health message for his audience.
“I’ll tell anybody if they are starting off this wanting to lose weight, take your time and don’t just rush your heart into doing anything it is not prepared to do,” he said. “Let your heart come to walk with you. A lot of people can over-stain their heart by trying to get it all in one day. You can’t do that. Just pace yourself so you don’t pass out.”
Johnson said he is tucking in his new clothes so others can see he now has a waistline.
“That’s love,” he said. “The fat dude don’t get to kiss nobody in the movie, so I want to tongue-kiss somebody in the movie, so I said, ‘let me cut it off so I can have sex with my shirt off now.”
