If you open a newspaper, turn on the television or go to watch a film at the cinema, the chances are that you’ll find yourself looking at the faces of celebrities all boasting perfect smiles. Straight teeth which are dazzlingly white and perfectly even are the rule when it comes to actors, presenters and other celebrities, but the days when they were the only people who could claim this are long gone. Thanks to advances in know-how and technology it is now possible for ordinary people to seek out cosmetic dental treatment capable of completely transforming the appearance of their smile. Having the smile you’ve always dreamed of isn’t simply about looking good, it’s about feeling good. The knowledge that your smile looks as appealing as possible will fill you with confidence in a huge variety of work and social situations. More importantly, not having to worry about your teeth being discoloured, damaged, crooked or missing will mean you can simply forget about them altogether and concentrate on expressing your personality, being relaxed in a manner which will mean those you interact with are also at ease.
There’s simply no escaping the fact that people judge by appearances, and that one of the strongest signals you can send out is via the condition of your smile. The better it is, the more people will assume that you’re a happy, healthy person who looks after themselves. This is just one reason why so many celebrities insist on having flawless teeth, but the truth of the matter is that they weren’t born that way. Like everyone else, celebrities start with a smile which has its’ faults and problems, but they visit celebrity smile clinics in London, or elsewhere, and have these faults dealt with. The good news is that the average person can now follow suit, and arrange a treatment, or programme of treatments, which can give them a smile a Hollywood star would be proud of. The following is a list of a few of the celebrities who have had their smile transformed, detailing what was wrong with their teeth and how they set about having it sorted out:
Mike Tyson
The combination of boxing and teeth is never going to be a happy one, with the damage caused by heavy blows to the face being all but inevitable. This is even more the case when heavyweight boxing is involved, and the condition of former world champion and now retired boxer Mike Tyson’s teeth was testament to this. Not that all of his problems were caused by boxing. The main feature of his smile, visible every time he opened his mouth, was the huge gap between his top two front teeth. Whilst a small or even medium sized gap may be looked upon as an idiosyncratic quirk – as is the case with a celebrity like Madonna – the gap in Mike Tyson’s teeth was so large it created the impression of a tooth being missing. On top of this, he had several gold caps on his front teeth for a while, something which merely served to draw attention to the problem. Looking at his smile now, it’s clear that Mike Tyson has had the gap closed, probably via orthodontics, and has had veneers fitted in order to make his teeth look smaller, more even and closer together than they ever have.
Nicolas Cage
Nicolas Cage is a Hollywood superstar with a difference. Early in his career he was renowned as much for his wild and eccentric behaviour off the screen as he was for his performance on it, and these performances tended to centre on playing more extreme characters behaving in a strange and often unsettling manner. At this stage in his career, whilst concentrating on ‘character’ type parts, the fact that his smile was less than perfect wasn’t so much a hindrance and, indeed, was probably felt to add to the ‘authenticity’ and realism of his performances. This approach to his smile probably reached its’ peak when making the 1984 film ‘Birdy’, before which he actually had two of his teeth removed, reputedly without the aid of anaesthetic. Admittedly, the treatment had been planned beforehand, but Nicolas Cage embarked upon it to coincide with filming for reasons of ‘character development’ and with scant regard to the appearance of his smile. That’s why older pictures of the star show teeth which are crooked, uneven and overcrowded, something which he dealt with when taking the step up to leading man roles. Looking at his flawless smile in films like ‘The Rock’ and ‘Family Man’ it’s clear that Nicolas Cage has had a full set of veneers fitted, a move which has given him a smile which is dazzling, straight and even.
Cheryl Cole
Cheryl Cole first rose to fame as a member of Girls Aloud, a group which won the UK talent contest ‘Popstars: The Rivals’, in 2002. Unlike many such competition winners, the group went on to have a successful recording career, achieving four UK number ones and twenty top ten singles in a row. In 2010, the group split up, reuniting in 2012 before disbanding for the final time in 2013. Several members of the group attempted to carve solo careers for themselves, but by far the most successful was Cheryl Cole, who had several hit singles and became famous as a model and pin up, being voted FHM Sexiest Woman in the World for two years running. Her celebrity status was cemented when she married Premier League footballer Ashley Cole, and even the break-up of this marriage did nothing to dent her fame. It was when she became a judge on TV talent show ‘X Factor’ that she decided to take steps to transform her smile. In the earlier episodes, her teeth can be seen to be overlong and pointed, with some sizeable gaps between them. Before too long, however, she had visited a cosmetic dentist in order to have the longer teeth ‘whittled’ down and the larger gaps eliminated, leaving her with a stunning set of straight, evenly sized and spaced teeth.
Ben Affleck
Ben Affleck is one of the biggest stars in Hollywood, and a major part of this success has been his clean cut, handsome leading man good looks. A major component of this has been the classic ‘Hollywood’ smile, featuring teeth which are all evenly sized, totally white and flawless and straight and true. When Ben became a tabloid target during his short lived marriage to Jennifer Lopez, the need to look his best at all times became even more important, with paparazzi snapshots filling newspapers and magazines all around the world. It’s interesting to look back at shots of a younger Ben Affleck then and note that, when growing up, he was effected by the fairly common problem of having ‘buck teeth’, a top row of teeth which protrude too far over the bottom row, a problem which afflicts many youngsters and which can lead to problems with speaking and eating as well as looking unappealing. After undergoing several cosmetic dentistry treatments, probably including orthodontics and the fitting of veneers, Ben Affleck had the kind of perfect teeth which allowed him to move up to the celebrity A league and play the lead role in blockbusters like the upcoming ‘Batman vs Superman’ film. Batman might not smile very much, but when he does, it just has to be perfect.
Louis Walsh
Louis Walsh spent many years as the manager of several successful pop groups in his native Ireland, working as a mentor and guide to performers such as Boyzone, Westlife and Samantha Mumba. As someone working behind the scenes rather than in the spotlight, it may be that Louis Walsh felt the condition of his teeth and the appearance of his smile weren’t too important. Anyone in any walk of life who has had cosmetic dentistry treatment will tell you, however, that it leads to a huge boost in confidence and the ability to relax and full express your personality. Perhaps those were the reasons why Louis opted for cosmetic dentistry after becoming a full time judge and mentor on the TV talent show ‘X Factor’. Now that he was going to be watched by millions of people every week he decided to do something about his teeth, transforming the appearance of his smile. He had the teeth that were crooked shifted into line utilising orthodontic treatment and then completed the transformation by having his previously yellowing and stained teeth brightened until they were as white and bright as those of the boy bands he manages.
Miley Cyrus
Pop star Miley Cyrus is famed for undergoing a dramatic transformation from Disney teen sweetheart to polished adult pop star who is not afraid to act in an outrageous and somewhat shocking manner. What many people might not have noticed, however, is that her smile underwent a similar transformation at around the same time. Back in the days when she was playing the innocent, girl next door country and western starlet Hannah Montana, the fact that her teeth were slightly crooked wasn’t seen as being an issue, perhaps even being seen as a factor which would make her look more ‘normal’ to her fans, and allow them to relate to the fact that were having similar problems in their own lives. When she decided to make the leap to sophisticated pop and rock star, however, she decided that a new, more grown up look was needed, and to this end she had her teeth whitened and straightened, so that any irregularities were ironed out. The fact that her trademark pose consists of sticking her tongue out means that this dazzling transformation receives the maximum time in the spotlight.
Jim Carrey
Jim Carrey, Hollywood funny man and star of films such as The Mask, Ace Ventura:Pet Detective and The Cable Guy is a fairly rare example of a film star who picks and chooses when to sport his own ‘normal’ teeth and when to go for the improved option. Anyone who has seen the classic comedy ‘Dumb and Dumber’, or indeed any of its’ sequels, will be aware of the fact that the character played by Jim Carrey, Lloyd Christmas, sports a badly chipped front tooth which helps to give him an air of craziness, goofiness or, not to put too fine a point on it, stupidity. This, in itself, is an excellent example of the way in which faults in a person’s teeth will be used by others in order to make snap judgements about them. The point is that the chipped tooth was no triumph of special effects, it was actually Jim Carrey’s own tooth, chipped during an accident whilst he was a child. For the rest of the time, Jim has the tooth bonded, rendering his smile completely even and fault free, but when he wants to slip back into the character of the ultra-stupid Lloyd, or simply wants to give his fans something to laugh at, he removes the bonding, leaving the chipped tooth on display in all its’ glory. The fact that a simple chipped tooth can create that much of a transformation in the way a person is looked at and evaluated should tell you everything you need to know about the transformative power of cosmetic dentistry.
Catherine Zeta Jones
Catherine Zeta Jones first rose to fame in the hit TV series ‘The Darling Buds of May’ and has since gone on to be a Hollywood superstar in films such as The Mask of Zorro, Entrapment and Chicago, as well as marrying genuine Hollywood royalty in the person of Michael Douglas. One of the reasons for her success, besides hard work and talent, is the fact that she is regarded as a great beauty, and a large part of this can be attributed to the perfection of her smile. It wasn’t always like this, however, since Catherine Zeta Jones actually grew up as a young child suffering teasing and taunts over the fact that she had crooked teeth. Like many teenagers, she had an orthodontic brace fitted to straighten them and then, after becoming famous, undertook further treatments to make them even straighter and to have them whitened.
Morgan Freeman
Morgan Freeman is rightly acclaimed as being one of the best actors working today, famed for the gravitas and dignity he brings to every role he plays. Like many older people, however, he found that his teeth were becoming more yellow as the years went by. Often, this is linked to diet or poor hygiene but it is also, sadly, a natural side- effect of the ageing process. The fact that he was regularly seeing his teeth projected in full colour and several feet high on the cinema screen meant that Morgan Freeman decided he had to do something about the appearance of his smile. The treatment he undertook included extensive and highly effective whitening treatments and techniques to move his teeth closer together and eliminate the large gap at the front. Not only did this transformation knock years off his age, it also opened up a whole new phase of his career, playing parts in films such as Red, Last Vegas and Lucy, which he would previously have been considered too old looking to land.
Cher Lloyd
Cher Lloyd is yet another of our examples closely associated with the TV programme ‘X Factor’. She appeared in the 7th series of the programme in 2010, and finished fourth, before being signed to Simon Cowell’s ‘Syco’ label and achieving a number one hit with her first single. Despite this success, however, Cher was anything other than happy with the state of her teeth, telling a magazine interviewing her that she thought her teeth made her look like a rabbit and she hated them. The treatment she opted for in order to deal with the protruding two front teeth and the noticeable gap in between was to have them straightened and the two front teeth shifted closer together.
That’s how celebrities deal with a smile which they aren’t happy with, but the exact same treatments are now available for all kinds of patients, with special offers and payment plans making them as affordable as they are desirable. Perhaps you’re looking for the best teeth whitening for a smile makeover? Maybe you’d like to access treatments such as dental implants, Invisalign – the ‘invisible braces’ which shift teeth in the most comfortable and least obtrusive manner – or veneers. In many cases, your dentist will recommend a smile makeover plan. This is a programme of separate treatments which combine to completely transform your teeth, giving you the kind of celebrity smile which is simply bound to transform your personality as well as your appearance. Book an appointment with Perfect Smile today, and find out just what we can do for you.