Everybody's Talkin' About Plastic Surgery

It's no secret that celebrities (gasp!) have plastic surgery, but it does seem like people are getting pretty darn sick of it.

In an article from this Sunday's LA Times, Mary McNamara writes :

To avoid those angry denials through publicists, and to appear above the proletariat fixation with appearance, mostly we in the mainstream press say nothing. Or rather we say nothing in print and then run into our editor's office to say what everyone else across the country is saying: "Oh, my Lord, did you see what she did to her face?"

Me, I think it's time to come clean. If cosmetic surgery and other age-battling or appearance-altering procedures are part of the zeitgeist, then we need to figure out a way to discuss it critically without seeming like we are engaging in some form of gotcha.

Beyond being able to write about celebrity surgery, she asserts that:

Television is a visual art, and if people are going to significantly alter the way they look in ways not directly connected with the roles they are playing, it can affect not only their performance but the whole tone of the show.

So you tell me, what is a critic supposed to say when part of the problem with a show is that the leading lady's face seems incapable of movement or her eyes appear to be moving toward the sides of her head or her lips just look weird?

Should critics be able to critique actors who's surgical endeavors are not only a distraction but a liability to the film? Nicole Kidman's turn in Invasion, the alien invasion flick she co-starred in with Daniel Craig, was admirable, but less so, however, for her acting skills and more so for the blessed coincidence that her artificially frozen forehead enabled her to oh-so-easily blend in with the emotionless alien drones she was trying to avoid.

In any case, McNamara's thoughts proved to be timely, as this week's issue of Newsweek features an article on some newly discovered dangers of Botox, namely it's tendency to leak into one's brain.

But, according to the Telegraph, there's been an almost-seismic boom in male plastic surgery, thanks largely in part to such imitable alpha-males as Nicholas Sarkozy and Michael Douglas.

But lastly, and most importantly: What are your thoughts? Who do you think has the worst plastic surgery? Would you ever have plastic surgery? Please tell us your thoughts!