Heart & Soul

Rochelle Aytes pauses, then laughs because she knows what she’s about to say next will be quite grating. “I’m slim by nature,” she says, dragging her sentence out, “but truthfully, I’ve always wanted to be a little bit bigger.”

“I don’t work out that much, but let’s say I have an audition and the character has gotta be really tough, or if I know I have to show my legs or wear a dress. Seriously, I have the smallest legs. People work out to lose weight, I work out to bulk up,” she says giggling. (She prefers calf raises and leg extensions.) “So if I know I have to show my legs or my body, I’ll go into the gym heavy to get that muscle tone in my calves or in my stomach. I’ve always been that way. I’ve been opposite. When I was in college, I would always go to the gym just to get my calves bigger because I was too small. We all have something we don’t like about ourselves.”