Dylan Sprouse refused to tell ‘fat jokes’ on Suite Life of Zack & Cody

US actor Kim Rhodes has shared how Dylan and Cole Sprouse were fiercely loyal to her and “defended” her while filming TheSuite Life of Zack & Cody.

Rhodes, 54, starred as Carey Martin – the on-screen mum to the Sprouse brothers’ titular twins – on the popular Noughties Disney Channel sitcom.

Speaking on a recent episode of the Back to the Best podcast, Rhodes recalled working alongside the two pre-teens. She remembered one particular moment when Dylan came to her defence, refusing to tell a disrespectful “fat joke” at her expense.

“They defended me all the way through. I got pregnant when I was on the show, and of course the show dealt with it by making fat jokes,” she recounted.

“One of my favourite memories is Dylan had a line that was a fat joke, and he just kept skipping over it,” she shared. “It was, like, in the middle of a chunk of dialogue, so he kept skipping this laugh line… And finally we get in front of the studio audience and he skips it, and the executive producer screams, ‘Cut! Dylan, say the line!’ And he goes, ‘I would not disrespect any woman that way, let alone this woman. You write something funny and I’ll say it.’”

Calling them “my little men”, Rhodes added: “They both were very protective of everyone on set. It wasn’t just me… The fact that they, at such a young age, understood that it was their job to make sure everybody else was able to do their job, was really impressive.”

The Independent has contacted Disney Channel for comment.

In an interview with The New York Times last year, Cole discussed the toll of childhood fame and admitted that he could not compare his experience to young female stars.

“The young women on the channel we were on [Disney Channel] were so heavily sexualised from such an earlier age than my brother and I that there’s absolutely no way that we could compare our experiences,” he said.

“So I’m violently defensive against people who mock some of the young women who were on the channel when I was younger because I don’t feel like it adequately comprehends the humanity of that experience and what it takes to recover.”

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Dylan and Cole, 31, are best known for their respective portrayals of Cody and Zack Martin on The Suite Life of Zack & Cody and its subsequent spin-offs, including The Suite Life on Deck.

Both have continued acting since their time on the hit Disney series, with Cole going on to star in the CW’s recently completed seven-series drama, Riverdale. He also starred opposite Haley Lu Richardson in the 2019 romance drama Five Feet Apart, and Lana Condor in 2022’s romance sci-fi, Moonshot.

Meanwhile, Dylan recently featured in the 2023 rom-com Beautiful Disaster. Earlier this summer, he married Hungarian model Barbara Palvin.