As she travels around the world filming her upcoming reality show The Price of Beauty, Jessica Simpson – who underwent criticism for her weight earlier this year – is learning that "beauty starts within," her father Joe tells Usmagazine.com.
"She’s always scrutinized by the world and [it's great] to watch her go to other countries and see women talk about what is beautiful there," he told Us Friday at a gala in Beverly Hills for the international charity Operation Smile. "We were just in Uganda, and a beauty ambassador [there] knew Jessica’s total story about her weight and blah, blah, blah. [She said] to Jessica that it’s about who you are inside, which is the message of our show."
Asked if he has given his daughter, 29, any advice on how to handle the weight issue, Joe told Us, "I don’t have to tell her anything anymore. She’s wise."
He said he also brushes off any criticism aimed at Jessica or his other daughter Ashlee.
"The girls are wonderful kids who have so much to offer, and as a father, the greatest frustration in the world is that people are told who they are instead of knowing who they are," he said. "So the hardest thing for me as a parent is to say that’s not who my child is; you don’t know the girl because she’s the same girl she’s always been. She’s with children in Uganda or children in Japan or Thailand — she has an open heart and loves these people. I think you'll see that on our show. I think it's the greatest show that women can experience because it's all women all around the world talking about beauty and the message is always the same: It starts inside."
What can viewers expect?
Jessica "becomes a Geisha in Japan," Joe told Us. "In Uganda, we sat in a fattening hut because, in Uganda … fat is beautiful. So the bigger you are, the more beautiful you are. She was with a girl who had been in a hut preparing for her wedding for two months and 25 days on a 5,000 calorie-a-day diet."
Next stop: Morocco.
"It’s going to be beautiful," he said.
Jessica agreed, telling Us, "It's going to be amazing … we're leaving the day after tomorrow I think."
