Fantastic Beasts Dan Fogler Talks Losing 100 Pounds Ahead Of Second Movie And How He Did It

Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler) sits at an outdoor table in "Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them'

Fantastic BeastsJacob Kowalski's status as a no-Mag makes him one of the more distinctive characters in the franchise. However, he may catch fans of the Harry Potter spinoff's eyes in a whole new way when the third film hits theaters, because Dan Fogler, the actor who plays him, has seriously slimmed down over the past few years. In fact, between the first movie and Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald, he started dropping what would ultimately be 100 pounds.

It will still be a little while before we can see the Fantastic Beasts gang back in action again. But Dan Fogler has stayed busy in a few ways, such as making an appearance in The Walking Dead, and fans have noticed the change in his appearance on both the big and small screen. Dan Fogler recently revealed the steps he initially took to lose weight -- and they included giving up some of his go-to comfort foods:

I did intermittent fasting and I hit 40 and my body was like, my metabolism was thrown out the fucking window. I had to stop eating foods that were processed. All I was eating was processed. So I had to really balance that out with actual food food. And that was really the first 60 pounds that came off. Eliminating soda, bread, shit like that. Dairy. You know I love pizza. I was living on pizza.

Dan Fogler admitted to Lauren Francesca that he’s like a lot of us, and the COVID-19 pandemic has meant that he’s gained back a bit of what he initially lost, but in general he's figured out ways to be happier and healthier with his diet.

I got my quarantwenty teen now. It’s not my quaran15 anymore, it’s 20 now. I gained 20 pounds like that. I was 270 lbs at my heaviest. That was documented in the first Fantastic Beasts film. That was my heaviest. Then, I started losing weight, so by the second Fantastic Beasts film I lost 20-30 pounds. Then, uh, over two years I had lost about 100 pounds. So it was crazy. Right now, I’m about 195 so I’m down about 75 pounds, it’s crazy.

However, his ultimate weight loss results are pretty incredible -- and that they were so drastic he actually ended up getting some unexpected reactions:

I went down to 160 pounds. I went from 270 to 160. People were looking at me just like, ‘Are you dying?’ I’d be like, ‘No, I’m perfectly healthy, probably the healthiest I’ve ever been in my life.’ They’d just be like, ‘In that case, you look amazing.’ I don’t like people guessing that I’m dying. So I put on a few pounds just so I feel like everyone’s OK around me.

So it’s safe to say that when we see Jacob Kowalsi in Fantastic Beasts 3, he'll still be looking pretty good, though perhaps not where he was at at peak weightloss. How, or if, that will play into his storyline remains to be seen, but we’ll find out when the movie hits theaters. It’s currently scheduled to do that in February 2021.

Katherine Webb