When a celebrity adopts an unconventional new hairstyle, it always makes headlines, and nothing attracts more curiosity or comment than a shaved head, especially when the head in question belongs to a woman.
But the words “shaved” and “bald” tend to be used too often these days, for haircuts that bear little resemblance to baldness, haircuts that would never be called shaves if they were on a man. If we want to be picky, a shave requires a razor, and baldness usually means a smooth head. Is it because we’re so obsessed with the idea that women need long, luxurious tresses that anything substantially less than that is bald? Is it just creative press hype? You make your own decision.
To illustrate, here are a variety of famous women who have reportedly gone bald at some point in their careers. Let’s see who was really clean shaven and who wasn’t?
Persis Khambatta (Star Trek: The Motion Picture) – Unmistakably clean shaven and completely bald. She would go so far as to declare Persis the benchmark for celebrity female baldness. She had a smooth dome, bald and totally naked. She doesn’t come much smoother than the model and former beauty queen circa 1978-79. Years after her death, it remains the image most associated with her.
Britney Spears – She put it on her skin, but Britney didn’t get to shave the back of her neck. Why, of all the silly things Britney did at the time, is cutting her hair considered the ultimate proof of her insanity? It is undoubtedly one of the most benign.
Natalie Portman (V for Vendetta) – A really nice combination. Someone who already has a following of horny fans, and is usually thought of as sexy, cuts for a movie role and sports an unshaven beard both on and off screen. There are definite parallels with Persis, and Portman might as well have done for female shaved heads what Persis did for bald women, but let’s be perfectly honest. Natalie Portman was not bald.
Amber Rose: Bleached blonde hair creates an illusion of baldness to the casual observer, and she has pulled it quite close to the scalp at times, but she is not bald. As a famous model and girlfriend, she seems to get some criticism for her extreme hairstyle. I think she looks fantastic, although she’s not the type of girl she would take home to meet her mom.
Cassie, Rihanna, and the rest of the buzz side girls: The side with the single razor is an interesting look, it draws attention, but come on. That’s not even remotely close to a bald head.
Sigourney Weaver (Alien 3) – Buzzed really close, but not smooth. I admired her reaction when she was asked to remove her hair for the film. She wanted more money. Good for her. I can never decide if Sigourney looks good in a buzz or not, but I can never decide if she finds Sigourney attractive or not. Her appeal seems to change from movie to movie, and I can never figure out why.
Maggie McOmie (THX 1138) – Maggie could be up for debate. She shaved clean before filming began, but on screen we see her sporting different amounts of peach fuzz. I guess she counts as shaved, because she really did have a shaved head.
Demi Moore (GI Jane) – This is another gray area. I wasn’t bald for the movie. She snipped it off on screen and spent the rest of the movie just a bit of a beard, so she technically didn’t go bald. However, after Demi finished filming the movie, she shaved her head on her own time and appeared in public with her dome shaved. Very cool.
Bai Ling (Anna and the King) – Shaved, for sure. Bai Ling is another one with real guts, as her raven hair was past her bum when she shaved her head, and it was just for some real baldness on screen.
Joan Chen (You Seng: Temptation of a Monk) – Not only did Joan shave her head, but we also get to see some latherless razor shaving in this Asian movie. Chen’s character, a bounty hunter of sorts, poses as an initiate to infiltrate a temple where a fugitive general is posing as a monk. Chen shaved his head for only a brief part of the film. Again, a truly bald dome, and not a bad movie either.
Samantha Morton (Minority Report) – Though portrayed by the media at the time as bald or clean-shaven, Samantha Morton was taken aback by the role of Agatha, one of three psychics enslaved by future police to predict criminal acts before. they occur. She definitely she is not bald.
Annie Burgstede (Smallville) – A bald spot seems like a reasonable move for a character homicidally obsessed with Lex Luthor, but doing it for real, and doing it for real, is more than I expected from Smallville. I have to salute any woman who shaves her head completely for the final act of an hour-long television episode. That goes double for Burgstede, when it comes to a teen drama filled with beautiful people, and she’s the crazy bald guy who shares a scene with perfectly coiffed Erica Durance. pretty brave
Virginia Hey (Farscape) – In Mad Max 2, she was the hottie with the crossbow and the big golden hair from the ’80s. And in the ’90s, she adopted a bald pate to play an alien hottie (shades of Persis by there) in the Farscape series. She was already in love with the role when the topic of shaving her head came up and she was ready to do it. What’s really impressive here is the commitment. It’s one thing to shave your head for a movie role or a single episode, but it’s quite another to do it for a series that could require you to remain bald for most of the next four or five years.
Linh Dan Pham and Simona Maicanescu (Dante 01) – Both the women and the entire cast shaved off the top for this French sci-fi flick. I’m not exactly sure why, apart from giving things a sterile, dystopian look, and it was reminiscent of both THX 1138 and Alien 3.
Delphine Chaneac (Splice) – With all the digital tricks the filmmakers used to turn this charming French actress into a genetically modified human-animal chimera, you’d almost have expected them to fake the bald head too, but it’s the real deal. Chaneac apparently had no qualifications to shave his head and enjoyed being bald. And despite the somewhat unnatural nature of her character, she manages to be very pretty, in a creepy sort of way.
Robin Tunney (Empire Records): He’s not shaven, but he does get a close on-screen razor cut for the role of a troubled teen. A memorable scene in an otherwise forgettable movie.
Judith Light (Ingenuity) – Judith Light, from the 1980s sitcom Who’s the Boss, shaved her head for the role of Prof. Vivian Bearing in this drama, as many other actresses have done to star in many TV productions. the work over the years. A professional stage play is another potentially long-term commitment to staying bald, and this was a drastic change from the fluffy blonde hair of the ’80s that we all remember.
Emma Thompson (Wit) – Thompson shaved for the role of Bearing in HBO’s made-for-TV movie Wit.
Sofia Vassilieva (My Sister’s Keeper) – The teen actress shaved off her hair and eyebrows for the role of a cancer patient. Vassilieva said at the time that she was the least she could do for such a wonderful character, and that gave her a better idea of what she was going through as her character. She compares that to her co-star Cameron Diaz, who opted for a latex cap that gave her a droopy, swollen alien head. And yet, Diaz, looking anything but realistic, managed to capture headlines for how “bald” he looked. Go figure.
There are, of course, many more women in show business who have shaved or trimmed their hair, whether in public, on stage or on screen, or in the media, but the ones listed here say it well enough. good. If you know others, decide if they really shaved.
Just remember, there’s shaving and shaving, but bald spots never count…ever.
