What Is With... men’s heads looking bigger with age?

SINGAPORE – One of the more ludicrous suggestions to come out of the awards season just past was that a body double had posed as Canadian-American actor Jim Carrey at the Cesar Awards in end February.

The 64-year-old had appeared with an altered face. The happy-sad droop of his old eyes turned wide and open, his cheeks plump and skin smooth.

So voluble were the cries of cloning that his representatives issued a statement to affirm it was him.

It is an arch example of a new normal in Hollywood – public appearances that provoke concern in place of the old envy and awe.

Some time between American reality star Kris Jenner’s viral facelift and the Wicked: For Good movie premiere in 2025, red carpets began playing like a gallery of extreme thinness and age-reversing work.

Hollow cheeks, protruding shoulder bones, clavicles like rice terraces and a look of permanent surprise… There’s an unhappy game of bingo for you.

Not that Tinseltown’s twin passions for voiding the marks of time and fat are new or unsympathetic themes. But the rise of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and a caboodle of cosmetic procedures – buccal fat removal, fillers, brow lifts – have helped realise extreme beauty standards that are, ironically, no longer aspirational.

Heady business

In these uncanny times, there is a special pleasure to looking at Leonardo DiCaprio.

Like the pre-conspiracy Carrey, the 51-year-old American film star is a font of memes who can twitch and order his face into new attitudes at speed. This talent for expression was most recently captured in a viral clip from the Golden Globes in January, where he was caught on camera apparently discussing K-pop animatedly.

One of the most recognisable figures in cinema has mostly permitted his body to do what it wants and seems genuinely relaxed about the outcome.

And, as is the duty of the actor, continues to mirror life back at people, warts and all.

One wrinkle in particular has puzzled me for years – the unmistakable expansion of the Oscar winner’s head.

Confusion at his enlarged mug, far from the narrow dimensions of his pretty boy years, has been the subject of several niche Reddit threads and is a reliable undercurrent in social media comments on pictures of him, including recent snaps of his mustachioed glow-up at the Academy Awards on March 15. Note: confusion, not repulsion.

The fascination is not with the usual broadening of the cheeks caused by weight gain, but the curious appearance of a bigger head, predominantly observed in male celebrities.

Singapore aesthetic doctor Rachel Ho says she has had more mature male clients complain of the same bloating, and local writer Don Shiau has observed it in himself, friends and public figures alike.

But does a skull actually grow with age? The short answer is no, though it might appear to.

Says Dr Ho: “The adult human skull does not grow larger once skeletal maturity is reached, typically in one’s early 20s, as the cranial sutures have fused.

“However, the facial skeleton changes shape and dimension due to bone remodelling. The overlying skin, fat, muscle and ligaments also change, which can alter how broad or heavy the head and face appear in photographs.”

Dr David Loh, former president of the Society of Aesthetic Medicine (Singapore), says what people are observing is the loss of the “triangle of youth”, leading to heaviness in the lower face.

An underlying cause is fat distribution. Fat pads in the face atrophy unevenly, typically hitting in the temples and mid-cheek area first. The face becomes squarish as one loses the fat volumes in the upper face, while accumulating more fat in the jowls and under the chin, spots where fat pads may never atrophy, adds Dr Loh. The process begins in one’s late 20s.

Dr Ho also points to weight gain and a decline in testosterone levels that increase the proportions of fat distribution.

Teeth grinding and clenching can also enlarge the jaw, causing a wider face, she adds.

A change in lifestyle habits can arrest the growth. Trusty old exercising and dieting can reduce weight gain, while abstaining from alcohol can reduce facial puffiness, says Dr Ho. Aesthetic solutions include filler injections and skin-tightening energy devices.

There are no natural means of stopping facial skeleton changes, though dermal fillers to restore structural support and contours can target this, she adds.

No health concern

DiCaprio is the poster boy of male celebrities who are frequently raised in this conversation, but the phenomenon is not unique to men.

Says Dr Ho: “The physiological processes of ageing also happen to women. I think it affects males more subjectively as a strong and angular jawline is a feature of male dimorphism.”

Dr Loh reckons female celebrities are just more fastidious about their photo-taking. He has female patients presenting with the same heaviness of the lower face as men.

As for health risks, there is no cause for concern, he adds.

Mr Shiau, 45, recalls feeling amused when he first noticed his seemingly bigger head in his mid-30s, taking it as a natural product of ageing and an era of ultra-processed food.

Having settled into it without fuss, he sees the upside. In his narrow-headed 20s, his ears looked too big, “like Adam Driver big”, he says, referring to the American actor from the Star Wars sequel trilogy (2015 to 2019).

“Now that my head is broader, my ears aren’t as noticeable as before. Everything feels more proportionate.”