Olivia Wilde, 42, says becoming a director changed the way she viewed Hollywood’s beauty standards.
On Friday’s episode of “The Run-Through with Vogue,” Wilde spoke about aging and the pressures female actors face in the entertainment industry.
“It’s interesting because as a director, I now am constantly searching for actresses who can still move their faces, and it’s not easy,” Wilde told Vogue’s head of editorial content Chloe Malle.
Wilde said she doesn’t fault actors for getting cosmetic procedures because she understands the industry pressures they face.
“I am a product of the same machine. I am under the same pressures. I get it,” Wilde said, adding that she hopes the beauty industry would develop less aggressive anti-aging treatments than those currently available.
“There’s something so medieval about a lot of these things,” she added.
Female actors face an impossible balancing act between preserving their ability to perform and meeting Hollywood’s expectations around aging, she said.
“I’ve had the thing of people being like, ‘She looks old and dead and awful.’ And you’re like, ‘Fuck! How do you win? It’s impossible,'” she added.
Wilde isn’t the only actor to have spoken about the beauty standards women face in showbiz.
In June 2025, “White Lotus” star Carrie Coon said she is often typecast as older women despite being in her early 40s.
“My voice is lower, and I don’t have Botox, so I tend to play older than I am. And so I’ve always had a gravitas or some authority,” Coon said.
In April, Nikki Glaser said that once cosmetic procedures are financially accessible, choosing not to get them can begin to feel like a personal failing.
“It’s like that failure that you feel of anything that you could do that you’re not doing,” Glaser said.
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