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Phil Spector shocked the world last week – not when he was found guilty of murder, but when he appeared in his prison photo without his wig. I’m linking to it instead of embedding it because I don’t think you should be subjected to it unwillingly. Although Spector might be the creepiest, he’s definitely not the only man in entertainment to wear a toupee or a hairpiece. Here are 10 others…
1. Ted Danson has been wearing a toupee for years and even poked fun of it in an episode of Cheers when it surfaced that Sam Malone had a little help with his lush head of hair. Danson reportedly only wears the wig for movies and T.V. shows and doesn’t mind showing his thinning hair otherwise.
2. Frank Sinatra wore toupees for years, according to the man who worked on his hair for movies like The Manchurian Candidate. “He used to have some exceptionally good hairpieces,” Jerry Roman said. “But later on he got very sloppy. In his last five years he went into a synthetic piece which really did not look very natural.”
3. John Wayne wore a toupee since about 1948 on. But he never denied it, and in fact made a joke about it when a reported once asked him about his “phony” toupee. “It’s not phony,” he responded. “It’s real hair. Of course, it’s not mine, but it’s real.”
4. Humphrey Bogart wore a toupee but was never seen without it in public. His lover was a wig-maker who worked with Hollywood icons Ray Milland and Gary Cooper before she caught Bogie’s eye.
5. Burt Reynolds may have been in the closet about his toupee for years, but when he filed for bankruptcy, his unsettled accounts included $121,796.62 owed to Edward Katz Hair Design. When the court documents were made public, the Katz was out of the bag, so to speak…
6. Howard Cosell, according to his Washington Post obituary, wore a toupee for all of his public appearances, which was revealed when Muhammad Ali lifted it off of his head while they were live on the air in the 1960s.
7. Sean Connery is obviously a dashing bald man these days, but he’s actually been that way since the 007 days. Need proof? HollywoodFail has 10 of his worst hairpieces.
8. Bing Crosby wore a hairpiece for all of his movies, but in his later years, he hated wearing the toupee so much he started specifically picking out roles that had him wearing hats or nightcaps. His baldness became well-known when he decided to go toupee-less during the USO tours of WWII.
9. Jimmy Stewart started wearing a toupee in the early 1950s, but made it less obvious by making it a gray one. It wasn’t uncommon for him to go without in public, though.
10. Ben Affleck may or may not wear a toupee. A rumor began circulating a few years ago that Affleck and Vince Vaughn were wrestling around at a party, you know, like boys sometimes do, and Affleck’s toupee supposedly wasn’t secured and flipped back in front of several Hollywood notables. He swore them all to secrecy, but it leaked anyway. He has since denied it. What do you think?
Of course, these are just the tip of the iceberg. Other suspects include Marv Albert, Errol Flynn, Donald Trump (although most people who have seen him close up think it’s probably just a spectacular combover), Hank Williams, Jeremy Piven, Nicolas Cage, John Travolta, William Shatner and Mel Gibson. Are there more that belong on the list? Let us know in the comments.
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Comments (24)
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Brett Michaels!
posted by babysnakes on 6-23-2009 at 4:03 pm
Trump’s hair is real. A friend of mine worked for the organization a few years ago, during the \Apprentice\ hoopla.
posted by daveed on 6-23-2009 at 4:47 pm
I second the Brett Michaels comment! It’s so bad! I still can’t believe it didn’t come flying off at the Tonys!
Also, Bruce Willis wears tupees for some of his roles. But I don’t know if that qualifies for this Quick 10. . .
posted by Mavis on 6-23-2009 at 4:51 pm
“Humphrey Bogart wore a toupee but was never seen without it in *pubic*”?
posted by Becky on 6-23-2009 at 5:27 pm
I saw Bret Michaels in concert last week – the wig wasn’t as long as before (although he still was rocking the bandana and cowboy hat – which he only took off once)!
posted by Steve on 6-23-2009 at 6:50 pm
+1 funny unintentional ‘public’ typo. A high school teacher told my history class about his accidentally submitting his senior thesis about “pubic policy.” Also, you can move Marv Albert off the ‘maybe’ list. It became a subject of public record at his trial.
posted by Frank on 6-23-2009 at 7:53 pm
Steve Harvey
posted by Shayla on 6-24-2009 at 12:07 am
Brett Michaels toupee is attached to the bandana hahah i hope it’s tied down good the next time he performs.
posted by Jill...NOT Jillian on 6-24-2009 at 2:25 am
Dude, William Shatner!!!
posted by Danny on 6-24-2009 at 3:14 am
Burt Reynolds wasn’t in the closet about his rug. I remember him being interviewed on Later with Bob Costas (sometime in the 80’s?) where he joked that there were women in Italy going bald to give him his.
I vote for Willard Scott. NBC wrote a contract that he would wear a rug for his studio appearances. He followed his contract to the letter, and went bald on his live remotes, much to NBC’s chagrin.
posted by Scott A on 6-24-2009 at 4:05 am
Was there really EVER any question that Marv Albert wore a toupee?! Seriously!
posted by Hyacinth on 6-24-2009 at 8:37 am
Jeremy Piven for sure…you only have to go back like 10 years to one of his earlier movies, like PCU, and he has way less hair than he has now.
posted by Phill on 6-24-2009 at 9:59 am
The PM of Italy himself… Silvio Berlusconi!
posted by Kate on 6-24-2009 at 10:28 am
On the one hand, some guys can really rock a bald head, and it’s a shame that not more of them do. But it doesn’t seem fair that women can have fun with their hair and men can’t.
posted by Diana on 6-24-2009 at 11:00 am
I’ve heard that Ben Affleck rumor before. I’m not sure if I believe it or not, but I pretend to believe it to my fiance because he loves Ben Affleck and I love to tease him about it.
posted by Patty on 6-24-2009 at 12:09 pm
Pat Sajack, the host of Wheel of Fortune, wears one,too. Like a year or two ago, he finally opened up about it during that little minute or two of banter he does with Vanna White right before the credits roll. He even took it off right there on camera and revealed his bald head. Even Vanna was surprised.
posted by Melissa on 6-24-2009 at 1:03 pm
Ironic there is an add for hairdirect… Tagline “Really great hair delivered to your door.”
posted by Reddkatz on 6-24-2009 at 1:11 pm
What about Will Ferrell? His hair is never the same from one minute to the next!!
posted by Decam on 6-24-2009 at 1:17 pm
In Bill Shatners Autobiog, the last line is along the lines of…
“there are great mysteries in the world, like, do i wear a toupee”
posted by Parry on 6-24-2009 at 2:22 pm
John Travolta
posted by Alecto on 6-24-2009 at 9:34 pm
I think Shatner’s is some sort of weave – I’ve seen him up close, and you can see his scalp through it, whatever it is. But it’s not a bad effort at all, looks fairly natural, if you didn’t know he’d been fighting hair loss since the 60’s.
Didn’t Connery do a film where he wore a toupee throughout, then ripped it off on-screen at the end? I think it was ‘Cuba’, and it wasn’t in the script.
posted by Tarn on 6-25-2009 at 4:09 am
WOW
i have never seen sean connery in a binikin and boots before, with a braid in his hair.
posted by karina on 6-25-2009 at 11:58 pm
Late contribution, but:
Some have had hairjobs, transplants, and what not. Tom Arnold, Michael Keaton, Kevin James, Matthew McConaughy (yes, really, check out his mugshots). Most of these guys are easy to spot as their hair changes over there career.
All this to say, that I think Jeremy Piven is a transplant guy, not a wig guy (he was so bald at one point that he played the George Costanza character on the TV-show within a Tv-show on Seinfeld!)
What about Elton John? Transplant or Wig? George Kennedy toup’ed, Robert Picardo toup’ed on TV but never in public. Travolta toups in public but not at home, as does Brendan Fraser–candids are out there floating about on the Interwebs… Robert Forster has the worst hairjob ever–he transplanted and then it kept falling out, but he seems ok with it, and appears as is…
posted by TJ on 7-14-2009 at 4:14 pm
Oh, yeah–Nic Cage, worst hairjob ever. He should toup on top of his hairjob.
posted by TJ on 7-14-2009 at 4:17 pm