# What celebrity surprised you when you first learned of their true age? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 18, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449 "2014-04-18T22:31:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/121 "2014-06-17T10:46:24Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > For me, it was David Janssen. I knew him not from The Fugitive or Richard Diamond, but his later work, such as The Green Berets, Harry O, and the TV movie Birds of Prey (1973) where he seemed like a worn out old man (he played a WWII Flying Tiger pilot). He was the first celebrity whose passing I took note of, and I thought, “well, all ‘my’ old guys are starting to die off.” > > He was 48 when he died! In 1980. That means he was 10 years old when the Tigers were flying. He must have always looked about 15-20 years older than he was. IIRC, he died of a sudden heart attack, of all things. I remember watching him eat bagels with cream cheese and lox in a made-for-TV movie in the late '70s and thinking “That can’t be good for your health…” ☹ ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 10:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/122 "2014-06-17T10:50:23Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Yikes. I’ve never heard of Hargitay, who does look pretty good though not shockingly so; but I had heard of that Mansfield deal. “Not shockingly so”? She’s freakin’ gorgeous! :o IIRC, she was asleep in the back seat of the car when it tail-ended a truck. It happened in the wee hours of the morning, and the authorities hustled her out of there as soon as they arrived on the scene. If you do some Googling, you can find photos of the accident scene taken from news and police sources. They’re pretty gruesome! ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 11:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/123 "2014-06-17T11:47:14Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > . . . Sadly, Mariska was in the vehicle when her mother, Jayne Mansfield, was decapitated, although she’s always said she does not remember it. Wel, not quite. Her wig came off, and she did suffer a fatal head trauma that included a partial scalping, but her head did stay attached. ---
**Author:** ![crucible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@crucible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crucible)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/124 "2014-06-17T11:53:07Z")
I saw Vanessa Marcil in a made for TV movie recently and thought the movie must have been made in 1990 or so instead of 2013. Her age was never an issue in the movie, but I thought, at first, she was in her early twenties. She is 45, and looks to me like no more than 25. Tried to provide a link, no luck ---
**Author:** ![crucible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/5f8ce5/32.png) [@crucible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crucible)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/125 "2014-06-17T11:58:14Z")
[http://tinyurl.com/mdwxked](http://tinyurl.com/mdwxked) ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/126 "2014-06-17T17:51:32Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > I have never heard of him, but so you’re saying he was like 41 in [this cover photo?](http://www.iverfilmservices.com/uploads/6/9/0/7/6907299/3910964.jpg?674) Whoa. He looked older than Teller does now! Yep. He was like Abe Vigoda - born old.🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/127 "2014-06-17T18:48:13Z")
[Clive Dunn](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clive_Dunn) specialised in playing older men. He played the geriatric Corporal Jones when he was only 48. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/128 "2014-06-17T19:11:10Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Indeed, it’s usually more like in _The Graduate_, the classic example where the actress who played Mrs. Robinson was about the same age as Dustin Hoffman. Another famous example: in 1959’s _North by Northwest_, Jessie Royce Landis played Cary Grant’s mother, though she was only seven years older than he. At the time the story seemed even more notable as Landis claimed to have been born in November 1904, as compared with Grant’s birth date in January 1904–making her nearly a year younger than her “son.” But later research confirmed that like many actresses, she had shaved some years (in this case, eight) off her ‘official’ age. Even so, her best-known roles were of matronly ladies and mothers. ---
**Author:** ![phreesh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9fc29f/32.png) [@phreesh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phreesh)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/129 "2014-06-17T20:42:42Z")
Not so much shocked that Kevin Bacon is currently 55, as he’s been famous forever, but that he looks so amazing at that age. He had a few shirtless scenes in ‘The Following’ and he’s got the body of somebody 30 years younger. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/130 "2014-06-17T22:56:13Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Yikes. I’ve never heard of Hargitay, who does look pretty good though not shockingly so; but I had heard of that Mansfield deal. I find her especially attractive because she’s genuine. She more closely resembles her father, who died a few years ago. He was a well-known bodybuilder who did some acting. ---
**Author:** ![vontsira](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/51bf81/32.png) [@vontsira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vontsira)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2014, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/131 "2014-06-18T17:39:07Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > [Clive Dunn](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clive_Dunn) specialised in playing older men. He played the geriatric Corporal Jones when he was only 48. Something which surprised me still more re _Dad’s Army_, was to discover that John Laurie, who played the lovably grumpy Private Frazer, was a World War I veteran in real life – he was born in 1897. He was aged 71 when the series began, and 80 when it ended. ---
**Author:** ![vontsira](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/51bf81/32.png) [@vontsira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vontsira)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2014, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/132 "2014-06-18T18:25:34Z")
This person may not rate as a “celebrity” per the definitions favoured by some participants here; but one who came to mind for me when reading the thread title, was Madhur Jaffrey. Sometime actress, and food writer; Indian-born but, for long past, living in the West – author of many books and central figure of television programmes, about Asian cuisine; and setter-out of admirably clear and straightforward recipes, re same. I had for long, hazily reckoned that she was kind-of ageless – in her sixties at the most. Was surprised to discover by chance lately, that she was born in 1933: her present age is 80. Her reminiscences in some of her books about her childhood and early adolescence in Delhi, thus refer to events in the era of the British Raj, before India / Pakistan’s independence and partition. Until very recently, as they say “I had no idea”. ---
**Author:** ![zamboniracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/e9a140/32.png) [@zamboniracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zamboniracer)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2014, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/133 "2014-06-18T18:36:33Z")
For me the answer is Stacey Dash, the beautiful actress [turned Fox News Flack](http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2014/05/28/stacey-dash-joins-fox-news-as-contributor/)who is most famous for playing Cher’s friend in the movie and subsequent TV show, “Clueless.” Dash, who was born in 1966, was creditably playing a teenaged girl while her own age was over 30. I was floored when I found out her age. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2014, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/134 "2014-06-20T11:11:53Z")
Roy Williams, the ‘old man’ in the old Mickey Mouse Club, was only three years older than Jimmy Dodd, the host. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2014, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/135 "2014-06-21T14:13:37Z")
Just recently I learned that Angelina Jolie is 39. I thought she was in her 40s. It’s not a looks thing, just a feeling for how long she’s been around, and how old she must’ve been in her early roles. I also thought Anne Hathaway was older. And Scarlett Johanson. All of them for just how ubiquitous they are, not looks. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2014, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/136 "2014-06-21T14:15:53Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Just recently I learned that Angelina Jolie is 39. I thought she was in her 40s. It’s not a looks thing, just a feeling for how long she’s been around, and how old she must’ve been in her early roles. It’s not that crazy really. Her first big role was in Hackers in 1995. She would have been around 18 years old when it was being filmed and she played an 18 year old. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2014, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449/137 "2014-06-22T10:07:57Z")
But it’s common for those playing eighteen year olds to be at least five and often ten years older, so I see the point. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-celebrity-surprised-you-when-you-first-learned-of-their-true-age/686449.md?page=6)