Entertainment

Groom for improvement

BEFORE
“I’ll do what it takes to make myself worthy!”

BEFORE
“I’ll do what it takes to make myself worthy!” (Jonathan Baskin)

On July 12, 2011, with a ring in my pocket, I got down on one knee and proposed marriage to my then-girlfriend, Jane Wexler.

As my knee hit the pavement, a seam in my trousers ripped.

This should make even the most indifferent dieter a little worried. Over the next year, I went on a low-grade mission to lose weight, but in August, with just over a month to go before my wedding, I kicked it into high gear with diet and exercise. Plus, it couldn’t hurt to get a haircut. And a beard trim. Here is my makeover journal …

40 days to go: 200 pounds. Booze and desserts are hereby out.

36 days: Jane gets a job offer. We go to Tom Colicchio’s Craft to celebrate. I don’t go near the scale the next day.

32 days: After a five-day vacation, I get on the scale. 202 pounds.

31 days: Salad for lunch. Hummus for dinner. Ten-mile walk. Diet is back on!

26 days: I’m assigned to write a story about smoking meat in your apartment. Diet goes off the rails again.

25 days: It’s time to call in the professionals. I meet Sebastian Morel-Ferreira, a personal trainer at New York Sports Club.

“Let’s take your measurements,” Sebastian says.

PHOTOS: THE GROOM MAKEOVER

My weight slightly improved: 199. Plus, Sebastian took a measuring tape to my shoulders: 48 inches. Arms: 13½ inches. Chest: 44 inches. Stomach: 40 inches. Waist: 41 inches. (One’s shoulders and arms should ideally expand through fitness — tummy, chest and waist should contract.) My body-fat percentage is an unhealthy 32.6 percent.

24 days: First part of the workout is tolerable: running on a treadmill.

Next, Sebastian gets me on the floor for push-ups. “Uh, I can’t do that,” I say. I had just broken my wrist, and my doctor had specifically advised against it.

Instead, Sebastian gets me in a push-up position, being held up by my forearms, and instructs me to move my legs like I’m scaling a mountain.

Then there’s an exercise with a big, heavy jump-rope. And more running.

“Not bad!” says Sebastian. “A lot of people throw up their first day.”

I instantly feel dizzy.

22 days: As I’m registering my NYSC card, I tell the manager of the gym I’m getting married in a few weeks. “You don’t have any idea how many brides I’ve trained,” she says.

“Any grooms?”

She looks taken aback by the question.

“I’m not sure,” she says after a minute.

12 days: My mother has recommended a spot in the East Village called Hair Kuwayama for a $70 haircut.

“You look like that filmmaker — the documentary filmmaker,” says the hairdresser.

“Which one?”

After a few moments, the name finally dawns on her: “Michael Moore.”

Say what? “Not in your body,” she says. “Just in the face.”

At least I have 12 more days.

10 days: Time to do a weigh-in. 197. Not as great as I hoped, but not as bad as I feared.

3 days: I go to the Art of Shaving and have the first professional beard trimming of my life from a Russian named Boris Mirzakandov. (Boris also gamely agrees to shave the hair between my eyebrows.) For $35, I might go back.

Final weigh-in: 195. Shoulders are a muscular 50 inches. Arms are 15 inches (three more than when I first came to Sebastian). And I had lost in all the right places: My chest is now 41 inches; stomach 37 inches; waist 38 inches. And my body-fat percentage is now 20 percent.

The big day: As I step out to the back of the farm where we’re having our wedding and I see my gorgeous bride in her wedding gown, the tears of joy come.

Dinner. Dancing. And as we strut our stuff on dance floor, I do not look like Michael Moore.