Male Celebrities Who Were Unrecognizable After Plastic Surgery

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. That seems to be the rallying cry for male celebrities who are entering the anti-aging chat in increasing numbers. From minimally invasive procedures like neurotoxins, fillers, and lasers, to full-on facelifts, men are joining the war on Mother Nature that many women have been waging for years. And who can blame them? In a highly competitive industry that is hyper-focused on youth and beauty, the male ego is not immune to the Internet age where public opinion is often the only thing unfiltered. "Although there has been a steady increase in male patients in my practice in the last decade, the most notable increase has been in the last five years," Jennifer Levine, MD, a double board-certified plastic surgeon in New York City, told Town and Country. She added, "Men are typically looking for a result that is much more subtle than your typical female facelift patients." 

That maybe true, but celebrities aren't known for being "typical," and some of Hollywood's hottest seem to have gone a step too far in their quest to maintain swoon-worthy status. From eye lifts to "bro-tox," neck lifts to liposuction, there are many male celebrities who were unrecognizable after plastic surgery, whether they cop to having it or not. Their shocking results certainly made them the center of attention, but probably not in the ways they had hoped. These men have learned something that women have known for years: The quest for beauty always comes at a cost. 

Known for his rugged good looks and gravelly voice, the late Kenny Rogers was a country music icon. From his early days with The First Edition to a solo career that spawned hits like "Lady" and "The Gambler," Rogers' talent was legendary. But then Rogers took a gamble on his face and got eye-opening results he wasn't betting on. Maybe it was the influence of Rogers' relationship with Dolly Parton, who has always been open about her cosmetic procedures, or maybe it was an attempt to keep up with his fifth wife, Wanda Miller, who was 28 years his junior. Whatever the reason, Rogers went under the knife, and he was very vocal about the results.  

During an appearance on Anderson Live, Rogers attributed the decision to too much time and money on his hands. "It was all for the sake of what I thought was looking better," he told the audience. In an interview with Fox News to promote his book, "Luck or Something Like It," the country crooner admitted that he had some regrets about the decision: "I didn't like the way he did my eyes, but I see all these other guys who have had it done and theirs are worse than mine. I'm not going to complain anymore." Instead, Rogers maintained a sense of humor about the experience, and Parton revealed on the Howard Stern show that she gave her long-time buddy some good-natured ribbing about it shortly before he died: "I said, Kenny, I'm glad I got to live long enough to see you grow into your facelift." The "Jolene" singer added that this made Rogers "feel better."

It can be said that Philip Andre "Mickey" Rourke Jr, who was known for his classic movie star looks, was destined for the silver screen, but the truth is that his acting career was entirely accidental. "The Wrestler" star's first love was boxing, a sport that he was reportedly good at until an injury took him out of the ring and into a friend's play. He began to pursue his new craft with dedication and, after a series of small roles, Rourke scored a knockout with the steamy "9½ Weeks" alongside Kim Basinger and became an overnight sex symbol. But rather than become the next big thing, the actor's star fell almost as quickly as it rose. Rumors of substance use, along with a reputation for being challenging to work with led Rourke back to the boxing ring. When he reemerged more than a decade later, it was to critical acclaim for his work, but critics and fans were less forgiving of his face. 

Rourke has admitted to several surgeries to repair a broken nose and cheekbone, but he won't divulge specific details."Most of it was to mend the mess of my face because of the boxing, but I went to the wrong guy to put my face back together," he told The Daily Mail. Aesthetic doctor and hair transplant surgeon Hala Elgmati speculated to Mirror that Rourke is simply "overdone"  and noted that "the work Mickey has done has negatively affected his facial proportions, to the point where it's now quite jarring to the human eye." Regardless, most would agree that Rourke looked wildly different before those procedures.

Sylvester Stallone will always be synonymous with Rocky Balboa, the prize fighter with the heart of gold that sprang from the actor's own imaginationand spawned a franchise that has stood the test of time. But while his career has aged with grace, the "Tulsa King" star, like all of us, has gotten older and he has admitted that he's not going down without a fight. "How do you age gracefully?" he asked in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter. "There's nothing graceful about you. The older I get, the more I try to embrace my inner kid. The only way I really feel my age is because I've had so many injuries. I've had five back operations, three neck fusions, both shoulders done, knees, ankles, fist — you name it. It's been more than 25 times that I've been put out."

Some speculate that a few of those 25 procedures might have been for facelifts. The "Rambo" star, who has admitted to having the left side of his face lifted due to it being injured at birth, told People that he has no issues with cosmetic procedures. "Sure. Why not do it?" he said. "You have body work done on your car." Plastic surgeon Dr. Richard Westreich told The U.S. Sun, "It is known that Sly has had a face [lift] at some point." He speculated that the actor likely had botox and filler. He also suggested that Stallone may have had some work done around his eyes: "It also looks like he's had his upper lids done, which is not unusual for middle-aged men." 

He was the King of Pop, but superstar Michael Jackson was also the king of plastic surgery. Few celebrities have sparked as much conversation around their appearance altering as the late "Man in the Mirror" singer, who radically transformed his facial features and some say even his skin coloring. The "Thriller" singer claimed his progressively lighter skin was due to vitiligo, and he would only fess up to undergoing two nose jobs and a procedure to add a chin cleft. In his autobiography "Moonwalk," Jackson wrote, "I have never had my cheeks altered or my eyes altered. I have not had my lips thinned, nor have I had dermabrasion or a skin peel." However, according to plastic surgeon Dr. Wallace Goodstein, who was in the same practice as one of Jackson's surgeons, that was not the case. "He had multiple surgeries," Goodstein told People. "He came in approximately every two months. It was about 10 to 12 surgeries in two years, while I was there." He added that Jackson "had multiple nose jobs, cheek implants, and he had a cleft put in his chin. He had eyelid surgery ... You name it, he had it."  

One of the events that may have kickstarted Jackson's journey with plastic surgery was the taunting he received at the hands of his father, Joe Jackson. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, the megastar said that his father teased him about his looks as a teen and constantly told him he was "ugly." Though, Jackson got the last laugh when it was revealed that he left his father out of his will. 

With a list of hit songs as long as his famous tongue, Gene Simmons of the band KISS has long been one of the most recognizable figures in rock and roll. Well, sort of. When Simmons and his bandmates first emerged on the scene, fans didn't know what they really looked like due to the heavy theatrical makeup that was part of their image. The makeup came off in later years, but for Simmons, the reinvention continued. He and his longtime partner Shannon Tweed, who is themother of his two children andformer Playboy Playmate of the Year, went under the knife together for an episode of their reality show, "Gene Simmons Family Jewels." The his and hers facelifts were performed by Dr. Frank Ryan of Beverly Hills. "I'd thought about it before," the bassist told People. "I was aware I had jowls. 

Simmons, who is rarely photographed without his signature black glasses, said he wouldn't recommend the procedure, but not for the reasons you might think. "Just because I order something off the menu, doesn't mean you should," he explained in a 2021 interview with the Sydney Morning Herald. "Order whatever makes you happy. Everybody's journey should be a personal choice. Don't look over your shoulder while you're running the race of life. Do the best you can. To thine own self be true." 

Staying alive means you have to keep getting older, but John Travolta may have had other ideas when he drastically altered his appearance. The most obvious change in the "Grease" star is that the hair on his head has moved south to his chin. But Travolta's stunning transformation appears to include more than just baldness, along with an impressive beard and mustache. Some have speculated that he's had a few nips and tucks that resulted in an overall tighter appearance to his face. Fans started to notice the transition when Travolta played Robert Shapiro in "The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story," and while it's not uncommon for actors to alter their appearance for a role, some say the "Saturday Night Fever" star used more than makeup and prosthetics to create his transformation.

Plastic Surgeon Dr. Andrew Ordon weighed in on the subject of Travolta's physical evolution on an episodee of "The Doctors," saying, "Clearly, looking at his face, he doesn't have any wrinkles, so he has plenty of Botox going on in there." Ordon also suspected that the star may have used fillers: "You can see the volume change that he's had in the jawline and cheekbone area, which is giving him a tighter look." As for the actor's comments on the subject, like the late O.J. Simpson, he hasn't admitted to anything. 

Disney's "High School Musical" franchise has propelled several young actors to fame and fortune, including the Hollywood heartthrob Zac Efron. His piercing blue eyes and sunny smile earned Efron a legion of loyal fans and a wide range of movie roles that proved he was more than just a pretty face. That distinction turned out to be important when a freak accident caused a severe injury that visibly altered the star's jawline, leading everyone from his fans to his own mother to wonder about his Efron's incredible transformation. 

The actor has admitted to going under the knife, but said it was to repair the injury he obtained after he slipped and fell in his home, essentially tearing his chin from his face. After surgery, Efron underwent facial physical therapy, but had to stop while filming a project. "The masseters just grew," he told Men's Health. "They just got really, really big." Efron pointed to the fact that he had to gain 15 pounds of muscle to play the role of professional wrestler Kevin Von Erich in "Iron Claw" as a reason for the drastic change in the way his face looked. "In the best way possible, I did not look anything like me," he told The Hollywood Reporter. "It was jarring at first, but we kind of put it together piece by piece." As for whether or not people believe his reasons, Efron doesn't care. As he said in Men's Health, "If I valued what other people thought of me to the extent that they may think I do, I definitely wouldn't be able to do this work."

Simon Cowell has been judging aspiring performers across the U.K. and the U.S. for decades, so it seems only fair that the public has cast a judgmental eye in his direction — specifically, in regards to a transformation that had Cowell looking unrecognizable. Professor Ullas Raghavan, a renowned cosmetic surgeon at Pall Mall Medical, told The Daily Mail that he believed Cowell had smoothed out his wrinkles with Botox and added volume with fillers. But Raghaven also suspected something more invasive. "He may have had a facelift to tighten the sagging skin around his jawline, giving him a more defined and sculpted look," he said. "I wouldn't be surprised if he's also had a face and neck lift, as well as a brow lift, which would elevate his brows and open up his eyes, giving him a more refreshed and alert appearance."

Known for this blunt delivery and no-holds-barred approach to critiquing others, it should come as no surprise that the music mogul has been equally upfront about how he has attempted to keep his boyish good looks throughout the years. He has copped to a thread lift, along with extensive use of botox and fillers. However, after an E-bike accident, Cowell received a wake-up call. He lost weight, adopted veganism, and began taking a more natural approach to aging and his looks. "For me now, it's all about having clean skin," he told The Sun. "Enough was enough. There is no filler in my face now at all. Zero." 

Maybe it's the influence of his wife Nicole Kidman, or maybe there was a good BOGO deal, but whatever the reason, country music singer Keith Urban seems to have embraced cosmetic enhancements as much as his screen star spouse. Kidman has drawn quite a bit of criticism over the years for her "frozen" appearance, so when fans started noticing a change in her husband's handsome face, they were quick to point it out. 

Urban has kept mum on the topic, but that hasn't stopped the rumor mill from churning, pulling the focus away from his music and onto his appearance. Maybe the bigger question is why people care so much about whether the singer has, in fact, undergone elective procedures. In an exclusive interview with The List, Dr. Samir Pancholi of Pancholi Cosmetic Surgery in Las Vegas, Nevada attributed the public's concern to the fact that Urban looks "unnatural" for a man his age. "When a celebrity's appearance is not deemed age-appropriate, it invites criticism from fans," he said. Pancholi added that in his expert opinion, Urban has indeed taken advantage of cosmetic procedures to try to maintain his good looks. "It is likely that Keith utilizes Botox injections in his forehead and around his eyes to reduce the appearance of lines and wrinkles, as well as filler in his brow, tear troughs, and jawline to reduce age-induced changes." Pancholi said he also suspects that Urban has used peels, lasers, or other skin tightening modalities around his eyes to smooth and soften the area. Though, only Urban and his injector know for sure, and he's not singing.

The older he gets, the more Steven Tyler's fans have implied that the long-haired dude looks like a lady, and an elderly one at that. Although he's always rocked the long hair, Aerosmith's notoriously wild frontman has admitted to having a little work done over the years, specifically after a scary slip in the shower cut up his face and took out a tooth. The former "American Idol" judge was in Paraguay on tour at the time and was taken to the best hospital in the area to repair the damages. "It was like one-stop shopping," Tyler said on the Today show in 2011. "They stitched up my eye, they did a little plastic surgery, and they fixed my tooth all in one fell swoop." While he didn't go into specifics over what procedures he had done, Tyler was back on stage the following night, belting out the band's hits, albeit wearing sunglasses for most of the show. 

More concerning to some than his altered physical appearance, however, was that Tyler might have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol when he took his tumble. He assured viewers that was not the case. "It's nothing I don't understand. It makes me a little upset. But I get that people think that. It's something that bothers me and it's something I'll have to deal with for the rest of my life," he said.