Laura Linney may be a stunning beauty and accomplished actress, but she wants you to know that there hasn’t come a point in her career where she’s ever felt the pressure to go under the knife to find the fountain of youth. The 47-year-old The Big C actress says that loves her wrinkles and embraces ever age mark that pops up over the years. She also talks about people who over-tan, calling them “gingerbread people”:
“I’m an actress, and for me, [plastic surgery] is not the right choice. I have no problem with anybody doing whatever they want to do – really live and let live, and certainly never say never — but it doesn’t make sense for me at this point.”
“I’m lucky because I have good genes, and I take care of my skin and I’m aware of it, but I’m actually grateful to be aging,” she says. “A lot of people don’t get that privilege, so for me, whatever wrinkle I might have or whatever sagging might be there – most people don’t get to have that because there are so many people who die of melanoma every year, so I’m thrilled to have any wrinkle I can, and I don’t think it’s unattractive.”
What are her safe sun tips?
“Well, sunscreen, sunscreen, sunscreen [laughs] is always good, and I’m so pale that I burn very easily,” she says. “I’m lucky because I don’t like being in the sun a whole lot, just because the repercussions for me – I feel it, I go very red. I wear a lot of scarves because I get very burned through the décolletage area, and I love hats and I look good in hats, so I do wear hats. I do the big, crazy, Southern lady gardening hat, and I do the baseball cap. Normally it has a movie title on it. Crew hats. And I love fedoras.”
Still, she encourages everything in moderation.
“It doesn’t mean you can’t be in the sun. It just means you have to grow up and be a little responsible about it, and there’s so many people who complain about the consistency of sunscreen, what it does to makeup, it’s inconvenient. There are now so many different kinds of sunscreen – there are lotions, there are sprays, there are powders. There’s something for everybody out there. People just have to grow up, face the reality of the situation, and be responsible.”
Psst: She prefers powder sunscreen.
“Tanning is tricky, because a lot of people just look orange. I mean, they look like gingerbread people. I mean, they do. In an effort to look better, it doesn’t look better. It really doesn’t. I think what everyone is going for is looking healthy, not necessarily looking tan, but there’s an association of tan being healthy, and I think there’s a responsible way to do that.”
Take note, Jersey Shore.