Melissa McCarthy Says “Volatile” Set Left Her “Physically Ill”: “My Eyes Were Swelling Up”

With movies like Bridesmaids and The Heat, it’s hard to imagine Melissa McCarthy — the source of many of our belly laughs over the last decade — being anything but her cheery, hilarious self. However, she recently opened up about a time she worked in an extremely toxic environment for someone who made her “physically ill.”

McCarthy — who is starring as Ursula in the upcoming live-action remake of The Little Mermaid — told The Guardian about her torturous experience on one particular set.

“I did work for someone once who ran such a volatile, hostile set that it made me physically ill,” she said. “My eyes were swelling up, I was absorbing all of this nuttiness.”

McCarthy continued, “There were people weeping, visibly so upset by this one person. And I think that’s why the manipulation worked, because to get to me this person would fire people I loved, which kept me quiet. It was very effective.”

While she didn’t name who she was talking about, the Academy Award-nominated actress went on to explain how she broke free from the cycle.

“One day, I was like, ‘It stops today!’ I just kept saying to them, it stops, it stops,” she recalled. “And I know now I’ll never keep quiet again.”

Following her revelation, it comes as no surprise that McCarthy serves as an inspiration to her 22-year-old Little Mermaid co-star Halle Bailey, who plays Princess Ariel in the new Disney movie. In a recent interview with CNN, the breakout actress revealed how McCarthy taught her to stand up for herself.

“She was telling me, ‘Yeah, I had to learn. I wasn’t always this way, and when you’re young, you’re timid,'” Bailey said, before adding that the Nine Perfect Strangers star told her that as she’s gotten older, she’s learned how to “speak up and [say] what works for” her.

Bailey further praised McCarthy, who she watched “come onto set and be just so comfortable with who she was in her skin and [saw] her standing up for herself.”

The Little Mermaid hits theaters on Friday, May 26.