For Penn Jillette, weight loss is more than magic

Penn Jillette, the talking member of the magical duo Penn and Teller, says losing more than 100 pounds was a lot like doing magic. It was hard work.

Jillette lost one-third of his body weight over three months in late 2014-early 2015 and says he feels much better now that he carries 228 pounds on his 6-foot-7 frame.

He knows he lost the weight faster than most doctors recommend. He also knows — although he has kept it off for more than 10 months — he’s at risk of regaining the pounds. But Jillette believes he’ll beat the odds, because he has completely transformed the way he eats.

The biggest difference, he says in a phone interview while driving to perform at a casino in Oklahoma, is that he no longer eats like an American. Now, he says, he forgoes pizza, cheeseburgers and other processed food — and doesn’t miss them at all.

He’s writing about his success in a book due out next fall called Presto: How I made over 100 pounds Magically Disappear.

Jillette acknowledges that his approach is probably not the most sensible way to lose weight. But it worked for him, he says, because he doesn’t like making small changes.

“I’ve never in any way respected moderation. I don’t like it,” he says. “Once you go really, really intense and not like a grown-up, things get really fun. …You’re playing in the Sex Pistols, you’re not playing in the Eagles.”

Doctors generally discourage such extreme weight loss because it can lead to the formation of painful gallstones.

“There’s a lot of gall bladders that have been removed over the years as a consequence of rapid weight loss,” says Yoni Freedhoff, a family doctor and weight loss expert at the University of Ottawa in Canada.

Also, muscle tends to melt away faster than fat, unless there’s a lot of protein in the diet, says Freedhoff, author of The Diet Fix and founder of the Bariatric Medical Institute, a nutrition and weight management center in Ottawa.

Freedhoff praises Jillette’s success but says that for most people, making such radical change is difficult to sustain — which is why so many dieters rebound.

“The one question anybody on any diet needs to ask themselves — to know whether it’s the right one for them — is ‘Could I live like this happily for the rest of my life?’” Freedhoff says. “If the answer is yes, it’s a great choice.”

Jillette says he’s confident his eating habits are now permanent. Before he started, he promised himself that after three months he would allow himself an occasional treat. He couldn’t bear the thought of giving up pizza forever.

But now he doesn’t need it, and his cravings are for blueberries, guacamole and cashews, he says. “I walk by McDonald’s and there’s absolutely no desire.”

He says he eats mainly “whole plants,” giving up added oil, sugar, refined grains like bread and pasta, and all animal products. And he says he doesn’t count calories — though he’s conscious of not overeating high-calorie whole foods like nuts — and says he believes he has cut his daily intake to 1,500 to 2,000 calories a day from 5,000 to 6,000.

He did lose some muscle, he says, but he regained it after about three weeks of mild exercise. Now, he lifts weights about 10 minutes a day, gets a few minutes of aerobic exercise, and — of course — juggles.

In addition to the diet, Jillette uses a scale every day from Withings.com, which automatically records his weight and sends the information to his social network. He is now a paid spokesman for the company and is featured in a promotional video, but that relationship started after he lost the weight.

Jillette says he likes the communal aspect of Withings, not because he was motivated by the fear of being “busted” by his friends, but “because it turned looking at my scale into something we were all doing.” He and a dozen friends have lost an average of about 60 pounds each, in part by supporting one another.

The weight loss also has brought him substantial health benefits (though he lost some hair with his weight and now has some excess skin). Before the weight loss, Jillette says, he had “wicked, wicked high blood pressure, and I was on massive doses of about six blood pressure meds.”

As he cut back on salt and fat, the Withings blood pressure cuff sent automatic readings to his doctor, who regularly reduced his medication. That’s why it’s important to collaborate with a doctor for weight loss, Jillette says. “You can’t monkey with your blood pressure without a doc on board or you’re going to die.”

Jillette hopes that telling his weight loss story will be inspiring — that “if this fat guy can do it, anyone can.” But no one should slavishly follow his approach simply because it worked for him:

“If you’re getting medical advice from a Las Vegas magician, you are making bad life choices.”