@ 2024 Advocate Channel.
All Rights reserved

Jennifer Coolidge on Waitressing with Sandra Bullock

Jennifer Coolidge on Filming The White Lotus & Waitressing with Sandra Bullock in the 80s

White Lotus star Jennifer Coolidge revealed on Jimmy Kimmel Live what it was like to waitress with Sandra Bullock in NYC during the '80s.


The comedian and actress known for her roles in Legally Blonde and American Pie told Kimmel that she used to work at a restaurant called Canastels in NYC with Sandra Bullock in the 1980s.

While Bullock, who recently appeared on the show couldn't seem to remember much about that time period, Coolidge, who said she worked there longer than Bullock, still remembers it vividly.

"I remember it so much better than Sandra," said Coolidge. "Sandra really had her act together."

Coolidge however, admitted that she was quite the opposite of the Miss Congeniality actress at the time.

"[I was] partying a lot, you know, in those years, so it was like sort of 50/50 whether I made the shift or not," the actress said. "I couldn't get fired."

She went on to tell Kimmel a series of hilarious anecdotes.

Jennifer explained how she had to wear a white jacket at the restaurant, but her jackets were always stained, and since the nearest laundry mat was a mile and a half from where she lived, she would buy a new white jacket before each shift.

"I had close to 1,000 jackets," said Coolidge.

Kimmel jokingly responded,

"Most hospitals don't have that many white jackets."

In another amusing story, Coolidge explained how she was able to get out of working her Fourth of July shift.

"I went to Roosevelt Hospital and found an ambulance driver and he strapped a patch and a white thing around my head."

Coolidge called her restaurant manager and told him someone had put a cigarette out in her eye, an act she then had to keep up for the next few weeks.

She also talked about her role on the HBO series The White Lotus, a role that writer Mike White apparently created just for her.

Coolidge plays Tanya McQuoid, a wealthy, unstable women who is struggling with the death of her mother.

She recalled a trip she took with White to Africa years before the show where they stayed in tents together. Coolidge described the conditions as very "intimate."

"I think he was sort of amused by how strange I was on the trip," said Coolidge of White's inspiration for her role.

The White Lotus is streaming on HBO Max.

From our sponsors

From our partners

Top Stories

Peri Allen