Article on Money Hungry Elizabeth Culp

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Dan Aykroyd is the voice of “Yogi Bear” in the film version.

Culp

VH1

Fort Wayne’s Elizabeth Culp, third from left on the couch, is one of 24 weight-loss contestants on “Money Hungry.”

A local mom is in the thick of a battle over thickness on a new VH1 reality show called “Money Hungry.”

Actually, the battle is technically over, but completed episodes of the show have just started airing Mondays at 9 p.m.

So let’s talk about it as if it’s all happening in real time.

Fort Wayne’s Elizabeth Culp is one of 24 weight-loss contestants living in a Los Angeles house on the show, which is a far cry from anything that Jillian Michaels hosts or has hosted.

In “Money Hungry,” 12 teams have each put $10,000 into a pool with the understanding that the winners (meaning, the team that loses the greatest percentage of overall weight) take all.

But this isn’t the sort of show in which a drill sergeant screams the pounds off. In fact, the house is continually filled by VH1 saboteurs with junk food, Culp says.

“We walked into the house and there was a popcorn machine and a vending machine full of candy,” she says. “And the cupboards were stuffed with every kind of junk food imaginable.”

In addition, Culp says, gofers are always on standby.

If there’s a kind of food that the contestants want and it isn’t already in the house, she says, the gofers will get it for them.

Weekly challenges eliminate contestants “Survivor”-style.

“It’s a different kind of competition,” Culp says. “The choices are for the competitors to make.”

“Money Hungry” took Culp away from her Fort Wayne family for two months.

She cannot, for obvious reasons, disclose the outcome of the show.

Culp says she auditioned for it because her attempts to lose weight up to that point had always ended in failure.

“There’s no bigger accountability than being on national television,” she says.

Culp says her husband, Dave, has always supported her in all her endeavors.

“My (husband has) been wonderful,” she says. “He’s my biggest cheerleader. He has always loved me regardless of what size I am.”

Culp is perhaps best known locally as the co-owner with her husband of “Poop Happens,” a pet waste removal service.

Elizabeth Culp grew up in Portland, Ore., but she and her husband moved back to his hometown of Fort Wayne for good four years ago. So enamored did she become of Fort Wayne that she even moved her parents here.

“I love it so much,” Culp says. “We’re had the opportunity to buy our own home here, which on the West Coast is not always a realistic thing for a family to try to do.”