These 17 Celebrities Have Said 'No' to Plastic Surgery — Here's Why

As Meryl Streep wisely put it, "You have to embrace getting older"

In today's age, where countless celebrities set unattainable beauty standards via cosmetic procedures, the skincare industry floods the market with "anti-aging" products and social media beauty filters warp self-perceptions. As a result, it's become uncommon for individuals to publicly oppose these trends.

Yet, several stars have chosen to speak out against surgical enhancements and embrace their natural selves.

"I feel a responsibility to put myself out there as I am," former supermodel Paulina Porizkova told PEOPLE in October 2023. "Why do I need improvement? I'm in my prime right now. I'm sorry that you think my wrinkles dismiss me from being in my prime, but as a person, as a fully formed woman at the height of her power, this is it."

Whether to fight against societal pressures of "looking young" or to prevent any potential cosmetic disasters, these celebrities have committed to steering clear of plastic surgery.

Barbra Streisand

In her 2023 memoir, My Name Is Barbra, Barbra Streisand recounted the numerous instances where people suggested she get a nose job and dental caps to advance her career in Hollywood.

"I thought, 'Isn't my talent enough? A nose job would hurt and be expensive," ' the EGOT-winning singer said. "Besides, how could I trust anyone to do exactly what I wanted and no more?"

Streisand continued, "It was too much of a risk. And who knew what it might do to my voice? Once a doctor told me I had a deviated septum … maybe that's why I sound the way I do. Besides, I liked long noses … the Italian actress Silvana Mangano had one, and everyone seemed to think she was beautiful."

Justine Bateman

Throughout the years, Justine Bateman has remained steadfast in her anti-plastic surgery beliefs.

In 2021, the Family Ties alum spoke to PEOPLE about the current age of plastic surgery and why she'll never undergo any cosmetic procedures.

"I find it really wrong that women right now are absorbing this idea that their faces need to be fixed," she said. "I realized my face is only going to get older. So why not take care of whatever fear I have attached to that."

The Emmy-nominated actress and Violet director continued, "I think getting all this plastic surgery is just people-pleasing. You don't want people to criticize you anymore, so you appease them. The more you do that, the further away you get away from your true self. It doesn't work for me."

Later, in 2023, Bateman addressed the online criticisms about her natural appearance.

"I just don't give a s---. I think I look rad. I think my face represents who I am. I like it," she said during an interview on 60 Minutes Australia. "I feel like I would erase not only all my authority that I have now, but also, I like feeling that I am a different person now than I was when I was 20. I like looking in the mirror and seeing that evidence."

Sarah Paulson

While speaking with her close friend Pedro Pascal in an April 2024 interview for Interview Magazine, Sarah Paulson opened up about her perspective on aging the natural way.

"Well, since I don't shoot anything into my face at this particular juncture, I imagine everyone knows I'm 49," the actress said. "If there's anything that's going to age me rapidly, it's going back to the theater."

She continued, "Sometimes I'm backstage doing this play, Appropriate, and I'm thinking, 'Wow, I'm making these facial expressions multiple times a day all day for months on end. I've never had those lines in between my eyebrows.' Well, I expect when I'm done with this play, they'll be there permanently."

Drew Barrymore

When it comes to herself, talk show host Drew Barrymore has a firm stance against plastic surgery for herself, though she holds no criticisms for those who choose it.

"I haven't done anything, and I'm going to maintain that as long as possible," she told PEOPLE in November 2023. "I have zero judgment for anyone doing anything. But I don't see myself resorting to it."

The actress and TV host added, "And I look forward to seeing what I look like as a leather bag in the future!"

Barrymore's hesitation towards cosmetic procedures stems largely from her fear of becoming fixated.

"I have a highly addictive personality, so I worry I'd continue to chase it, get this and that done," she explained. "That scares me, just because of my own approach to things. So, I'm waiting on making any alterations."

Paulina Porizkova

Porizkova has made it clear that she is #proaging.

"Combat age. Reverse aging. Rejuvenate. Anti age. None of this is possible. Yet, if you do an internet search on aging, this is what you'll get. Pills, potions and workouts to fight the aging process. You know what the only way to stop aging? Dying," the supermodel captioned a bikini photo on Instagram in 2021.

"But I do want to make the best of what I was given. And I want to shine a bright light in the dark corners of the shame that is heaped on women for daring to age," Porizkova continued. "I can't change the world alone, but if you feel like I do, there are some amazing women here on IG that I get inspired by everyday. There are many many more, and inspirations for all different reasons, but for now I'm just picking those who are accepting their aging and making it beautiful."

She finished the caption with a few hashtags: "#nobotox #nofillers #nointerventions YET #nofilter #noshame #proaging."

Sharon Osbourne

After an October 2021 facelift resulted in an unsettling outcome, Sharon Osbourne called it quits on any further procedures.

"That was the worst thing that I ever did. I looked like Cyclops," she told The Sunday Times in December 2023. "I had one eye here and one eye there, and my mouth was all skewwhiff, and then I had to wait for that to heal before I could go back and have it corrected."

The procedure was Osbourne's third rhytidectomy, following surgeries in 1987 and 2002, per her 2013 autobiography, Unbreakable. The TV personality attributed her retirement from cosmetic surgery to a recent facelift.

"That one put me off, and it frightens me," Osbourne told The Sun in August 2023. "I really f------ pushed it with the last facelift, and I am now like, no more ... Time is against me; I cannot have another facelift."

Emma Thompson

Emma Thompson was candid about her opinion on plastic surgery in 2014.

"It's mad," she told Hello Magazine. "It's not a normal thing to do, and the culture that we've created that says it's normal is not normal. Why do people ask persons to cut them open and put things into their body? What is that, what are we doing to ourselves?"

The Oscar-winning actress added that she's worried about how cosmetic surgery will affect the future of society: "It's chronically unhealthy, and there's this very serious side to all of that because we're going to end up with this sort of 'super-culture' that's going to suggest to young people, girls and boys, that this looks normal. And it's not normal."

Thompson doubled down on her take in early 2022, telling The Wrap she considers this phenomenon as "a form of collective psychosis."

She added, "I've always thought that, though. But I've always been a kind of card-carrying, militant feminist when it comes to women's bodies and what's been done to them, what we're told to expect of ourselves, what we're told to do to ourselves."

Pink

In 2020, Pink shared a candid "note to self" in a since-deleted post on Twitter (now X) about how she's beginning to notice the effects of aging and how they make her feel "weird" — but that she's working to embrace them.

"Dear Me, you're getting older. I see lines. Especially when you smile. Your nose is getting bigger… You look (and feel) weird as you get used to this new reality," she wrote. "But your nose looks like your kids, and your face wrinkles where you laugh… and yeah you idiot… u smoked."

The singer continued, "Every once in a while, you consider altering your face, and then you watch a show where you want to see what the person is feeling… and their face doesn't move. I cannot get behind it. I just can't."

To round out her empowering message, Pink encouraged her followers to "get on board cause I am about to AGE THE OL FASHIONED WAY (in a tutu ruling s--- at 30 mph 100 ft in the air over 40) yassssssss."

Pink refused to be shamed for aging naturally. Clapping back to an online troll who ridiculed her looks, she wrote in a deleted post on X: "Yes, although I don't feel old, and I still get to wear a leotard to work, growing older is actually my first 'grateful' every day. What a blessing to have life, years. To be this strong, to be able to still piss off complete strangers just by existing."

Meryl Streep

Meryl Streep is decidedly against plastic surgery after seeing it go wrong for too many of her peers.

"When I see it in people I meet, it's like an interruption in communication with them," she told Vanity Fair in December 2009. "It's like a flag in front of the view, and that, for an actor, is like wearing a veil — it's not a good thing."

In July 2008, she elaborated on the importance of embracing the "gift" of aging, telling Good Housekeeping, "You'd be amazed at how many men in this industry have gone down that road [of getting plastic surgery]."

Streep added, "I just don't get it. You have to embrace getting older. Life is precious, and when you've lost a lot of people, you realize each day is a gift."

Amanda Peet

"I've never gotten Botox or fillers," Amanda Peet said during a 2016 interview on SiriusXM's Conversations with Maria Menounos. "I've never done anything to my face that's 'invasive.' "

While the actress says being a mother probably influenced her decision to forgo injections, she does concede that a much less noble factor might have also affected her choice.

"I think it has a lot to do with having two girls," Peet said. "Maybe I'm afraid. I'm afraid … it's like I've never done cocaine either!"

Peet said that surgery not being involved in her beauty routine doesn't mean she hasn't put significant effort into her looks: "I've certainly spent a lot of time and money doing other stuff, and I certainly am vain!"

In a candid 2017 essay for Lena Dunham's Lenny Letter, Peet further explained why she refuses to go through cosmetic procedures.

"Since we're all going to get wrinkly and die, maybe we've got to move in the direction of acceptance about that," she wrote. "Botox or no Botox, we shouldn't feel bitter because we're ALL going to look like s---. Every last one of us. Even Alicia Vikander. (Sorry, Alicia.)"

Julianne Moore

"I hate to condemn people for doing [Botox], but I don't believe it makes people look better," Julianne Moore told Allure in October 2010. "I think it just makes them look like they had something done to their face. When you look at somebody who's had their face altered in some way, it just looks weird."

The Oscar winner later talked about the phrase "aging gracefully" in 2021, telling W Magazine, "There's so much judgment inherent in the term ... Is there an ungraceful way to age? We don't have an option, of course. No one has an option about aging, so it's not a positive or a negative thing; it just is."

She continued, "It's part of the human condition, so why are we always talking about it as if it is something that we have control over? How do we continue to evolve? How do we navigate life to have even deeper experiences? That should be what aging is about."

Halle Berry

Halle Berry admits that being an actress comes with a lot of "pressure" to get plastic surgery, but says she's standing her ground when it comes to nips and tucks.

"When you see everybody around you doing it, you have those moments when you think, 'To stay alive in this business, do I need to do the same thing?' I won't lie and tell you that those things don't cross my mind because somebody is always suggesting it to me," the actress told Yahoo! Beauty in 2015. "It's almost like crack that people are trying to push on you. That's what I feel like. I just have kept reminding myself that beauty really is as beauty does, and it is not so much about my physical self. Aging is natural, and that's going to happen to all of us."

She added, "I just want to always look like myself, even if that's an older version of myself. I think when you do too much of that cosmetic stuff, you become somebody else in a way."

Salma Hayek

"No surgical tweaks. No Botox either," Salma Hayek reportedly told InStyle in June 2010, confirming that she's never opted for cosmetic surgery.

"I think it is terrible, these girls in their late 20s injecting their faces and lips. One told me, 'If I kill my muscles now, I'll never get wrinkles.' Can you imagine?"

The actress revealed her beauty secret in 2015. 

"I use an ingredient called Tepezcohuite that's used in Mexico for burn victims because it completely regenerates the skin," she told Elle. "Some of the ingredients, when I took them to the American labs, they were like, 'Oh my God! How come nobody is using this?' This is why I have no Botox, no peels, no fillings."

Julia Roberts

"It's unfortunate that we live in such a panicked, dysmorphic society where women don't even give themselves a chance to see what they'll look like as older persons," Julia Roberts told Elle in August 2010. "I want to have some idea of what I'll look like before I start cleaning the slates. I want my kids to know when I'm pissed, when I'm happy, and when I'm confounded. Your face tells a story ... and it shouldn't be a story about your drive to the doctor's office."

In 2014, the actress told You Magazine that her anti-surgery views are rare in the business, stating, "By Hollywood standards, I guess I've already taken a big risk in not having had a facelift."

Jodie Foster

"[Plastic surgery is] not my thing," Jodie Foster told More magazine in 2007. "I don't have anything against it for other people. Whatever they want to do, I'm fine with it. For me, it's really a self-image thing. Like, I'd rather have somebody go, 'Wow, that girl has a bad nose' than, 'Wow, that girl has a bad nose job.' I'd rather have a comment about who I am than about something that identifies me as being ashamed of who I am."

Staying firm in her beliefs, Foster has had to learn how to embrace aging in Hollywood.

"Sixty was the best shift of all because I was struggling in my 50s. I was sort of like, 'Am I ever going to do anything meaningful again? Is this all there is," the actress told Interview Magazine in November 2023. "There's that awkward phase where everybody who's in their late forties or fifties is very busy getting all plumped and shooting s--- into their face. I didn't want that life, but I also knew that I couldn't compete with my old self."

She continued, "Then something happened when I turned 60. I was like, 'I figured it out. This is good.' There was something about going back to the work with a different attitude, I think, about really enjoying supporting other people and saying to myself, 'This is not my time. I had my time. This is their time.' "

Kate Winslet

Kate Winslet isn't shy about her staunch anti-surgery views. "It goes against my morals, the way that my parents brought me up, and what I consider to be natural beauty. I will never give in," she told The Telegraph in August 2011. "I am an actress; I don't want to freeze the expression of my face."

Rachel Hunter

The once pro-plastic surgery model said her views on the trend changed drastically after she traveled the world for her show, Tour of Beauty.

"I went from wanting it to absolutely no longer wanting it," Rachel Hunter said during an appearance on Today in 2016. "But also understanding that if that is what you need, then how can you judge somebody?"

She continued, "I live with my heart, and I live very passionately, and I would never change it. I want to like who looks back at me in the mirror. If I can be happy and excited and a full human being, that's a good thing."

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