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Melissa McCarthyhas been stealing scenes for years, but it took another iconic comedic actress to help her get her foot in the door.
“I didn’t know her. I was just a student and she was a company member at the Groundlings,” McCarthy recounted. “And she contacted a casting director — I didn’t know she knew I was alive — and said, ‘I think you should see this girl.’ And [casting director] Joseph Middleton, he’s like, ‘She doesn’t do that ever.'”
“I went in, and I gotGo, which was my first movie. And then I got an agent, and I was able to join SAG, and it’s all… before you ask Jennifer, she goes, ‘I didn’t do anything,'” McCarthy added in her best Coolidge voice. “But she did. She went out of her way and just was really kind to me.”
She went on to land her breakout role as Sookie St. James the next year inGilmore Girls, before going on to serve hilarious performances in movies likeBridesmaids,SpyandGhostbusters(2016). McCarthy’s also flexed her muscles as a dramatic actress in films likeThe KitchenandCan You Ever Forgive Me?, which earned her her second Academy Award nomination, following her first forBridesmaids.
McCarthy has praised Coolidge, 60, in the past for seeing something in her before she became the star she is today. She even imparted some sage wisdom that theWhite Lotusstar shared with her.
“Jennifer Coolidge, who is one of the funniest creatures on the planet and the reason I got my first job in a movie, taught me, ‘The second they stop working for you, fire them,'” McCarthysaidtoThe Hollywood Reporterin 2018. “Don’t think, ‘I don’t want to be a b—-, I don’t want to cause trouble.’ If you paid for a bottle of water and then that person told you to just take off, you’d say, ‘Give me my water. I paid for it.'”
See Melissa McCarthy inNine Perfect Strangers, all episodes now streaming on Hulu.
source: people.com
