Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Aging gracelessly
Alternate title: Gracelessland.
It wasn’t enough for 62-year-old Priscilla Presley to covet the face of a twenty-year-old; she also bought into “miracle injections” of auto lube-grade silicone from Argentinian gigolo-doctor Daniel Serrano.
I can’t imagine a worse thing to inject into someone’s face. I can imagine silicone injections, however. Back in training, I treated a young Vietnamese woman who, as a teenager, had silicone injections into her nose to Westernize it. (Low nasal bridge = Asian, high nasal bridge = Caucasian.) She developed recurrent severe inflammation treatable only with antibiotics and steroids, and her nasal bridge had become a scarred mass.
No one in his right mind injects silicone nowadays into any body part — not that I’m aware. If the inflammatory reaction doesn’t get you, silicone granulomas will. And this is medical grade silicone we’re talking about. God only knows what will happen to Ms. Presley’s Dr. Jiffy Lube-injected face.
TMZ.com has even more examples of celebrity plastic surgery nightmares. In fairness, not all of these before-and-afters are hideous. Sylvester Stallone, for example, is just as butt ugly as he ever was; at least he doesn’t look freakier. Dolly Parton — well, no one looks at her face anyway. At the other end of the spectrum are Michael Jackson wannabe LaToya Jackson, Fountain of Youth drowning victim Mickey Rourke (who really should have known better), Surgeon General of Beverly Hills* patient Wayne Newton, and extraterrestrial Joan Rivers.
It seems like most male actors manage to age gracefully. Robert De Niro isn’t trying to look like a 20-year-old. If he had a face lift, his surgeon was an artist — someone who could make a person look younger without leaving him with that “I could bounce a quarter on it!” face. I’ll bet Tommy Lee Jones hasn’t had plastic surgery, and I’d say the same for Morgan Freeman. But Mickey Rourke? Yeesh.
Hollywood isn’t as kind to its female actresses, but these women don’t have to play ingenues all their lives. It’s a losing game, and an unnecessary one. Aging faces didn’t stop Bette Davis or Joan Crawford from working late into their careers, and Lauren Bacall is still at it — and Ms. Bacall has not indulged:
Lauren Bacall, 81 [now 83], recently said she was astounded by the way people were trying to change the way they look. She said: “I have friends who are beautiful women, and they are having liposuction and boob lifts, and I say, ‘What are you doing to yourselves? Stop it!'”
“I disdain this whole youth sickness thing.”
Bravo. Hollywood needs more wrinkly, saggy actors and actresses. And the older I get, the more strongly I feel that way.
D.
*Brownie points for the person who recognizes that reference without googling it.
You want aging gracefully? I’ll give you aging… well… not gracefully exactly. Aging… vigorously.
Oh, and injecting silicone? Google “pumping parties”.
Particularly low-rent pumping parties have at times resorted to injecting silicone caulk. I’m sure you can imagine how those tend to end…
The first link: it must be damn difficult finding women your own age who are interested.
The second: oy. Silicone caulk? OY.
“I got yer silicone caulk right here” is one of those can’t-miss pickup lines in some neighborhoods!
Some of those pictures at TMZ demonstrate there are some real artists working as surgeons, but the percentage of fantastic work to horrible is so low I wonder at anyone being willing to take a chance.
I’m not so sure on the Jennifer Aniston “evidence”; given that she’s approximately my age and my skin looks comparable to hers as respects wrinkles and whatnot, I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt. But Demi Moore – holy cow! She must have a portrait up in her attic, no?
Mickey Rourke face looks like it might fly like a frisbee off his body. TOO. TIGHT.
I looked through all of those pictures and some of those were definitely look-alikes but not the real Stallone, I mean McCoy! Some of them I think are female impersonators – why would Dolly Parton get a squared jaw? Why does Kathy Griffin have an Adam’s apple and a bad wig? But I can’t find a surgeons’s cut on Janet Jackson, it’s amazing!