John Goodman’s trainer talks weight loss, intervention at cemetery: ‘Dig your grave’

nypost.com:

John Goodman’s remarkable transformation after he showed off his dramatic weight loss on the black carpet of the 62nd Monte Carlo TV Festival on Sunday.But the 70-year-old actor didn’t make this change at the snap of a finger — it took hard work, dedication and a very dramatic intervention.“People think this is overnight, but most people make a contribution to weight management, but they don’t make a commitment to it,” Goodman’s trainer Mackie Shilstone told The Post.Goodman and Shilstone live just two blocks away from each other in the Garden District in New Orleans, and the 72-year-old fitness expert first helped Goodman lose 85 pounds prior to Hurricane Katrina hitting in 2005.After Katrina hit, Goodman “really fell off” and regained the weight he had shed.“John decided that he was going to make a commitment,” Shilstone said. “I’ve known John for a long time, and 85 pounds coming off and then regained, it didn’t work.

So I said, ‘What am I gonna do?'”Shilstone is a fitness, wellness and sports performance specialist — not an actor — “but John was my friend and my neighbor, so I said to myself, let me become an actor for a moment.”Most people would expect to go with their trainers to a gym or recreational center, but Shilstone took his client somewhere slightly more unconventional for an intervention: a cemetery.The trainer took Goodman for a walk, shovel in hand, and went to an area of the cemetery with no graves — but with plenty of dirt.“I said, ‘John, here’s a shovel.

You told me you’re going to recommit yourself and follow this plan,'” Shilstone shared with The Post. “I said, ‘I want you to dig your grave.