Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

'Peloton Husband' addresses backlash over 'sexist' Christmas advert: 'That's not who I am'

‘My five seconds of air time created an array of malicious feedback that is all associated with my face’

Chelsea Ritschel

New York

Friday 06 December 2019 23:05 GMT

✕

Peloton bike commercial:'The Gift That Gives Back'

The actor who played the husband in Peloton’s recent Christmas ad has addressed the backlash surrounding the controversial commercial.

In the commercial, which went viral this week after it was deemed sexist, a man gifts his wife a Peloton exercise bike for Christmas. The ad then follows the wife’s year-long exercise journey, and ends with her thanking her TV husband for giving her the apparently life-changing gift.

“A year ago, I didn’t realise how much this would change me,” she says at one point.

In addition to accusations of sexism, many called the commercial “out of touch”.

On Thursday, Sean Hunter, an actor and elementary school teacher from Vancouver, Canada, reflected on his role as “Peloton Husband” in an interview with Psychology Toda y, as well as his hopes that the role does not have long-term impacts on his life.

"I pride myself on being a great teacher and developing actor, and I can only hope that this affects neither. I’m grappling with the negative opinions as none of them have been constructively helpful," Hunter said. “It’s really hard to improve when all feedback goes against any type of growth. I currently sit here hoping that I’ll be able to continue auditioning for commercials without any taint, and that if my students happen to find the commercial and recognise me, they won’t think about me any different than they already know me.”

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Show all 12

1/12The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Anne Hathaway

The 32-year-old actress said she has already experiences job rejections because of her age. “Now I'm in my early thirties and I'm like, 'Why did that 24-year-old get that part? I was that 24-year-old once. I can't be upset about it, it's the way things are,” she told Glamour.

EPA

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Helen Mirren

On news that Maggie Gyllenhaal had been turned down for being ‘too old’, aged 37, to play a 55-year-old man’s partner: “It’s f***ing outrageous. It’s ridiculous. Honestly, it’s so annoying. And ’twas ever thus. We all watched James Bond as he got more and more geriatric, and his girlfriends got younger and younger. It’s so annoying.”

Getty

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Maggie Gyllenhaal

Gyllenhaal revealed she was told by a Hollywood producer that she was too old, aged 37, to play the love interest of a 55-year-old man. “It was astonishing to me. It made me feel bad, and then it made feel angry, and then it made me laugh,” she said at the time.

Getty Images

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Meryl Streep

Meryl Streep has helped fund an all-female screenwriters group called The Writer’s Lab to encourage more women to pen Hollywood scripts. She previously told Vogue in 2011: “Once women pass childbearing age they could only be seen as grotesque on some level.”

Getty

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Emma Thompson

The actress said she thought Hollywood is “still completely s***” when it comes to treating women equally to men. ““When I was younger, I really did think we were on our way to a better world. And when I look at it now, it is in a worse state than I have known it, particularly for women, and I find that very disturbing and sad.”

EPA

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Elizabeth Banks

Banks said she was driven from acting to directing due to the lack of roles for older women in Hollywood. “"[Industry sexism] drove me to direct for sure. I definitely was feeling that I was unfulfilled and a little bit bored by the things that were coming across my desk. I mean look at Gwyneth Paltrow who has her Oscar [for Shakespeare in Love] and played fifth banana to Iron Man,” she told Deadline.

PA

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Viola Davis

“I had never seen a 49-year-old, dark-skinned woman who is not a size 2 be a sexualised role in TV or film. I'm a sexual woman, but nothing in my career has ever identified me as a sexualised woman. I was the prototype of the ‘mommified’ role,” she told The Hollywood Reporter.

Getty

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Liv Tyler

The Lord of the Rings actress said she only get cast in roles where she is treated as a “second class citizen” at the age of 38. “When you’re in your teens or twenties, there is an abundance of ingenue parts which are exciting to play. But at [my age], you’re usually the wife or the girlfriend - a sort of second-class citizen. There are more interesting roles for women when they get a bit older,” she told More magazine.

Getty Images

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Cate Blanchett

The actress famously called out sexism on the red carpet at the 2014 Screen Actors Guild Awards. When a camera operator scanned her up and down, she said: “Do you do this to the guys?” In her Oscar acceptance speech for Blue Jasmine, she reminded the film industry that movies with leading women can still be successful. “And thank you to... those of us in the industry who are still foolishly clinging to the idea that female films, with women at the centre, are niche experiences. They are not -- audiences want to see them and, in fact, they earn money. The world is round, people.”

Gareth Cattermole/Getty

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Ellen Page

Asked if she had ever encountered sexism in Hollywood, Page told The Guardian: ‘Oh my God, yeah! It's constant! It's how you're treated, it's how you're looked at, how you're expected to look in a photoshoot, it's how you're expected to shut up and not have an opinion, it's how you... If you're a girl and you don't fit the very specific vision of what a girl should be, which is always from a man's perspective, then you're a little bit at a loss.”

Getty Images

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Zoe Saldana

The actress says she refuses roles where she has to play the generic girlfriend, wife or sexy bombshell. "It's very hard being a woman in a man's world, and I recognised it was a man's world even when I was a kid. It's an inequality and injustice that drove me crazy, and which I always spoke out against — and I've always been outspoken,” she told Manhattan magazine.

Getty

The actors fighting against sexism in Hollywood

Charlize Theron

The actress spoke to ELLE about negotiating equal pay for the Snow White and the Huntsman sequel: "This is a good time for us to bring this to a place of fairness, and girls need to know that being a feminist is a good thing. It doesn't mean that you hate men. It means equal rights. If you're doing the same job, you should be compensated and treated in the same way."

Andreas Rentz/Getty Images

The actor also attempted to make it clear that he is not the person he portrays in the commercial - a "husband" that has been accused of being both “abusive” and a “symbol of the patriarchy”.

On Friday, Hunter appeared on Good Morning America, where he reiterated that he is not what his image has been associated with.

"People turned down a pretty dark path and it turned into a nasty thing," he said. "Once something goes viral, and it turns negative, people jump on that negative bandwagon and start to create any dialogue they want... My image is being associated with sexism, with the patriarchy, with abuse, with these words that I am seeing people write about me - that’s not who I am."

While Hunter has attempted to distance himself from the identity of “Peloton Husband”, he has at the same time embraced it.

On Instagram, where the actor has changed his username to @Pelotonhusband, he captioned a photo of himself appearing on CTV Vancouver on Friday: “The Peloton Husband speaks out. In his finest shirt too.”

Hunter was not the only one who was surprised by the negative reaction to the ad, as the exercise bike company also expressed disappointment that its ad had been “misinterpreted”.

“We constantly hear from our members how their lives have been meaningfully and positively impacted after purchasing or being gifted a Peloton Bike or Tread, often in ways that surprise them,” a Peloton spokesperson said in a statement to People. “Our holiday spot was created to celebrate that fitness and wellness journey. While we’re disappointed in how some have misinterpreted this commercial, we are encouraged by - and grateful for - the outpouring of support we’ve received from those who understand what we were trying to communicate.”

Following the release of the ad, Peloton’s market value fell by nearly $1.5bn (£1.1bn).

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies