Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Speaking of noses
Live-blogging tonight: 7:30 PM PST, or thereabouts.
We were watching the end of Dirty Dancing this afternoon, and I said, “Whatever happened to Jennifer Grey?” She was adorable in that movie. Can’t say I ever thought much of Patrick Swayze, but Jennifer? Yum. Guess how old she was in that movie. Don’t cheat, guess. I’ll tell you later.
“I think her career tanked after she got her nose job,” Karen said, which sparked my interest, given our discussion of noses in yesterday’s post. So I decided to see what I could learn on IMDB and Wikipedia. Now remember what I said — don’t cheat. Think back to Jennifer’s role in Dirty Dancing and guess, damn it, guess!
Hint: bear in mind that she has her dad‘s eternal youth.
Actors and other entertainers have a brand, just as writers do. Writers need to maintain a certain consistency in style and quality, while a performer needs to worry about his face and voice. No one expects perfection, and in fact, perfection is probably a liability. Individuality is what really counts. One example of a performer who made a career out of a unique face and voice: Barbra Streisand. And where would Marty Feldman have been without his eyes?
Twenty-seven. She was twenty-seven years old in Dirty Dancing. Woof.
As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I like strong noses. Big noses. Call them whatever you like. Jennifer Grey, circa Dirty Dancing, had a hell of a nose.
I don’t need to argue the importance of that nose; Jennifer will do it for me. This is from her Wikipedia entry:
In the early 1990s, Grey submitted to a rhinoplasty that was so botched she required a second plastic surgery to repair the damage. The result was a face so altered that even close friends failed to recognize her, and the major change in her appearance negatively impacted her career. Of the experience she said, “I went in the operating theatre a celebrity – and come out anonymous. It was like being in a witness protection program or being invisible.”
From her IMDB bio:
In a recent interview for Channel 5 (UK) she said that having plastic surgery to her nose was the worst mistake she had ever made. This was because she was no longer recognizable as the girl from the film Dirty Dancing (1987), just somebody who looked a bit like her.
See for yourself. Here are a couple of post-rhinoplasty photos. The first looks like a press release shot:
and the second is a photo of her with husband Clark Gregg:
Still gorgeous, but does she look like Jennifer Grey? Nope.
I suppose in a perfect world, talent would be the only thing influencing theatrical success. But there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? Some faces draw the eye, as do certain voices and mannerisms.
In our movie stars, we don’t long for the perfection of individual physical features. I would argue that we desire two things: symmetry and style (personality, glamour, je ne sais quoi). Case in point, one of the most beautiful stars of all time, Lauren Bacall:
Aside from those perfect cheekbones, none of her individual features would escape a plastic surgeon’s criticism. But symmetry? Yeah. Style? Ooh baby. Rent her first movie, To Have and Have Not. The woman sizzles (and she’s still making movies. I love her).
By the way, have I mentioned how much I really, really detest those plastic surgery make-over shows on TV? Despise them. Loathe them. Why? Because these dudes are in it for the money and they don’t even bother to disguise that fact on camera. A woman comes in for a nose job and leaves with chin and cheek implants, forehead lift, and blepharoplasties. Admittedly, sometimes one or more of these procedures are indicated; a classic example is the patient who doesn’t so much have a big nose as a weak chin. But more often than not, these surgeons are profiteers.
Some time ago, one of my patients went in for blephs and a face lift. I tried to talk her out of it. She was a beautiful older woman who was aging exceptionally well. From her point of view, however, she was just AGING and she wanted none of it. Post-op, did she look younger? Yup. Was she still beautiful? Yup. Was she better than she was before? Not in my opinion. She’s happy, though, and I suppose that’s what really matters most. But what created her desire to move the clock backward?
Back to Jennifer Grey. I wish I could give her her nose back. I can’t explain why, but it makes me very sad that someone bungled her nose and left her looking so very different — even if, ultimately, she’s still an attractive woman (and she is). If she had come to see me, I would have screamed bloody murder over the idea of a septorhinoplasty. Would I have been able to talk any sense into her?
Hmph. As many times as I have tried to discourage these patients, I usually fail.
D.
Nice live blogging last night. I had not read this post until today and it moved me to leave a response (and not to simply lurk like I usually do). I have had Grave’s disease for several years though it is now in remission and gone forever I hope. At first the disease gave me Marty Feldman eyes, then one eye that I could not close, and one that I could barely keep open. The wide open eye was always so dry that it hurt and teared. I had to tape it shut at night and put loads of greasy ointment in it. Then I got double vision, at first 24/7, but now only when I am tired, drunk, or looking down, so reading a book is hard, but staring straight ahead at the computer is fine. I took steroids for two years but finally have been steroid free since January. Thankfully, the wide open eye finally got back to normal, but the half closed eye only partially recovered. I have had three surgeries in the past year on my right eye to try and restore symmetry. The first time the right lid ended up too high, the second surgery was to bring it down a bit, and the third was to smooth out the skin on the upper eyelid. Last night I was at a party and a friend was staring at my eyes and she said WOW, your eyes match nearly perfectly now. It was the nicest compliment I have ever received. I felt like such a freak when my eyes were messed up because before all this happened I always thought my eyes were my best feature. I still need one more little touch up to fix a pesky overhang of skin that is not that bad, but I love my occuplastic surgeon and I think he will be able to fix it. Until it happens to you, you cannot know how hard it is to have your face disfigured. You can’t cover it up, and in my case, since my vision is also affected, I am constanly reminded of it. When it was really bad I scoured the internet looking for help which is why I actually ended up on your site. I also had terrible tinnitus and a google search landed my on your medical site. Lucky for me because I do enjoy this site a lot. As I said last night, always a surprise!
Glad things worked out for you, Lucie. Did anyone ever offer you a decompression? In the right hands, that operation can work wonders.
I probably didn’t distinguish as well as I should have the difference between plastic surgery for perfection vs. plastic surgery for deformity (congenital or acquired). The first is overutilized; the second is a godsend. I do a bit of the latter in my facial skin cancer practice, and I’m always delighted when I can get rid of a cancer and leave the patient looking as if she’d had little or no surgery.
At the worst point the proptosis was 26 and 27, and the internal pressure (I’m not sure of the medical term) was elevated, but thankfully, in my case I had a very good response to steroids. Within two weeks of starting steroid therapy, most of the proptosis resolved and over time disappeared completely. I started out taking 80mg medrol daily and over the course of a year it was decreased in stages down to 4 mg daily, then 4mg every other day for about a year, then 2mg for about a month then stopped completely. I was extensively tested also for Myasthenia Gravis, but tests were always negative, both for antibodies and the tensilon test. My thyroid tests have been normal throughout, so the diagnosis I got was euthyroid graves, but a neurologist I was referred to thought it could be idiopathic orbital myositis. The first occuplastic surgeon that my ophthalmologist referred me did not prescribe steroids, but rather wanted to take a wait and see approach. After waiting nearly a year with no improvement and increasing symptoms, my endocrinologist urged me to get a second opinion from another occuplastic surgeon who recommended steroids. Thankfully I took his advice and changed physicians. I am now a huge fan of second opinions. I blame my double vision on my first doctor, but maybe I shouldn’t, but it did not start until the disease had been evident for about 4 months. If I had started steroids right away I think it may not have occurred. It is much better now, but it is permanent. The double vision is not severe enough to be corrected surgically and I am too vain to wear the prisms, so I just live with it.
nothing to do with noses, just wondering what you’re going to do to celebrate “Bring ‘Em On” Day, tomorrow. The fourth anniversary of Bush’s Bring ‘Em On speech.
Lucie: yup, I’m a big fan of second opinions, too. I recommend them all the time, even to my own patients if I think it might prove helpful.
Kate: butbutbut it’s Blog Against Theocracy, AND I have to worry about Bring ‘Em On Day? What if I don’t feel political?
my hair is red. go see.
p.s. i hate my nose. it is too round at the end. if i ever win the lottery i’m making it more like my mom’s than my dad’s.
There is nothing wrong with your nose. PLEASE.
Lauren Bacall – yum at any age.
I hate those makeover shows, too. I forget the big popular one a while back, but women got a complete body and face makeover, including surgery, at once. And then they would cry because they were now so happy with how “beautiful” they were. I kept wondering, “what if they just had enough therapy to love themselves from the inside?” and “what’s going to happen to them when the show is over – will they always feel perfect, now?”
As for Jennifer Grey, there was a sitcom a few years back – again, having bad memory about the title, today – wherein she played herself. That’s right, she played Jennifer Grey, who nobody recognized and had to keep explaining about the surgery. Then, every few episodes, they’d make fun of the surgery again. It was bizarrely meta, and I can’t decide if it was courageous or desperate…
Yup, I read about that show when I was researching Grey. It lasted 18 episodes, so it didn’t exactly bomb; but 18 episodes ain’t exactly MASH, either.
Like I said, I feel for her. Getting the nose job was a mistake, but not such an egregious mistake that it should have cost her whole career.