‘Family Matters’ star Jaleel White was told to wear looser jeans to hide Steve Urkel’s ‘bulge’: book

nypost.com:

“Growing Up Urkel,” White, now 47, claims executives told him to wear looser jeans to conceal his “bulge” on the show, per the US Sun.According to him, they asked that he ditch Urkel’s signature tight suspenders and update his character’s wardrobe to more family-friendly attire after Season 8 as he aged.

White started the show when he was around 13 and finished when he was 22. “Let’s get rid of the suspenders. Lower his pants, too,” White alleged executives said. “Oh and … It’s getting a bit uncomfortable watching him in tight jeans.

There’s a, uh … bulge.”He recalled “peeling” Urkel’s snug jeans off “like a banana.”The child star also claimed that the “Family Matters” producers pushed to keep the sitcom going as long as they could, per the outlet, with White revealing it was “physically painful” for him to speak in Urkel’s high-pitched voice as he grew into a man.He also allegedly shared that he almost left the family show before its last season in 1998.White’s geeky character was a blessing and a curse, as he revealed on “The Viall Files” that he “never got invited to any parties” despite meeting Sean “Diddy” Combs. “I constantly say, ‘Rejection is God’s protection.’ I got left off the White Party list; I never really went out of my way to get myself invited to any of those things anyway.

That’s the way it is,” White explained on the Oct. 30 episode, mentioning Diddy’s annual party, per Us Weekly.The embattled rapper was arrested on Sept.