'Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights' Star Romola Garai Says She Was Body Shamed on Set

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Those Havana Nights were not a good experience for Romola Garai.

The 34-year-old actress recalls working on the 2004 prequel Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights, revealing that it opened her eyes to sexism in the movie industry.

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During an interview with U.K.'s The Guardian, Garai says a female producer on the film pointed to the then 17-year-old actress' legs on set and said, "'This isn’t good enough.'"

"It screwed me up for years," Garai says. "Not only did it completely change how I felt about my body, but I felt like I’d failed because I hadn’t fought back."

"I felt complicit, because I didn’t say no," she adds. "I signed off on Photoshopped images and felt terrible for perpetrating this… lie."

Even so, it did shape how she feels about misogyny today.

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"It was my feminist epiphany," she shares, claiming that the film was "a cesspit of horrific misogyny."

"I did a bit of modelling when I was a teenager and, even then, nobody asked me to lose weight," she shares. "It’s different with film, because it’s not about weight, it’s about control. ... I never went back to Hollywood again."

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