Rob McElhenney Wants to ‘Give It All Up’ to Be Fat Mac Again

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia star and creator Rob McElhenney misses his “Fat Mac” phase. Kaitlin Olson, not so much.

In terms of extreme physical transformation and devotion to the gig, McElhenney is to sitcoms what Christian Bale is to cinema — a laser-focused, body-changing chameleon whose discipline in diet and exercise borders on pathological. Just as Bale has seemingly no problem with wildly oscillating from being a rail-thin insomniac in The Machinist (2004) to becoming a shredded superhero in Batman Begins the very next year, McElhenney’s effort to gain 60 pounds in preparation for It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia Season Seven before cutting the wait and getting impossibly muscular in Season 13 is equal parts brave, impressive and medically ill-advised. 

However, let it never be said that the comedy legend can’t commit to a bit — he has always put his money where his mouth is, one tub of ice cream at a time.

Right now, McElhenney appears to be contented in his Muscular Mac body, having maintained the impressive physique for the past four seasons of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. But when an Always Sunny fan on Twitter revealed that they physically yearn for Fat Mac in a nostalgic thirst post, McElhenney admitted that his body is hungry for his obese alter ego as well:

Following the “Fat Mac” arc on It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, McElhenney detailed his diet during the offseason transformation that saw him gain 60 pounds in just three months. According to a conversation McElhenney had with actor Dax Shephard on the Armchair Expert podcast, the Always Sunny star achieved rapid rotundness with a strict regiment of Krispy Kreme donuts and “ice cream soup,” explaining, “I was drinking ice cream. I would take ice cream and I would put it out on the counter in the morning and then it would melt and then I would put weight gainer into it, and then I would drink (melted ice cream) every day.”

Then, when it came time for Mac to stop packing on mass and chisel his chunky body into a muscular marble statue, transforming his physique was laughably simple. “Look, it’s not that hard. All you need to do is lift weights six days a week, stop drinking alcohol, don’t eat anything after 7 p.m., don’t eat any carbs or sugar at all, in fact just don’t eat anything you like, get the personal trainer from Magic Mike, sleep nine hours a night, run three miles a day, and have a studio pay for the whole thing over a six to seven month span,” McElhenney explained in a 2018 Instagram post. “I don’t know why everyone’s not doing this.”

But, as easy as it was for McElhenney (or anyone) to go from morbidly obese to marvelously muscular in six months, he apparently misses the more rounded body he worked so hard to achieve. However, since his wife and co-star Olson much prefers this version of Mac for some reason, it’s unlikely that Always Sunny fans will ever get a Fat Macaissance. 

Thanks again, Dee.