Her new show about cancer may be called The Big C, but Gabourey Sidibe now inadvertently finds herself the focus of another big "c"—as in controversy.
Speculation has been running rampant on the Web that the folks behind the new Elle cover featuring the Oscar-nominated Precious star purposely lightened her skin.
But the criticism doesn't end there…
For its 25th anniversary issue, the magazine created four covers, each one focusing on four different young stars. In addition to Gabourey, the others spotlighted are Megan Fox, Amanda Seyfried and Lauren Conrad.
While the other three all appear in full-length poses, the photo of Gabourey has been cropped at mid-chest level, and thus, not showing her full-figured frame.
Elle, however, insists all its subjects were treated the same.
"Nothing out of the ordinary was done," the magazine said in a statement.
"We have four separate covers this month and Gabby's cover was not retouched any more or less than the others. We had 25 cover-worthy subjects in our portfolio and we chose Gabby because of who she is. We shot this as a story of exuberant young women changing the world. If you take a look at the portfolio, each of the women were shot in different ways and for different reasons."
Sure enough, if you look at some of the Oscar nominee's more recent red carpet appearances, it certainly seems like there's been no foul play.
But what say you?