Age can be a big deal in Hollywood — especially for women. For example, when Maggie Gyllenhaal was 37, she was told she was "too old" to play the love interest to a 55-year-old man. So, it's honestly not surprising that some performers lie about their age. Other times, however, they're accused of lying about their age solely because they don't fit someone else's mental picture of what someone that old should look like.
Here are 11 times celebs were accused of or caught lying about their ages:
1. In 2020, a journalist who was researching if Tana Mongeau got a PPP loan tweeted about finding the influencer's age listed as 30 on LexisNexis, a legal website. Quickly putting a stop to speculation, Tana tweeted a photo of her drivers license, proving herself to be 22.
She tweeted, "imagine me taking my id out of my wallet rn and taking a picture of it and hunter goes 'what are you doing' and i go 'stopping a scandal before it starts.'"
That's not the first time Tana addressed speculation about her age. Back in 2016, she mocked rumors that she was actually 40 in her "Roast Yourself Challenge" YouTube video.
2. In 2023, James Blunt told the Guardian, "If you look at my Wikipedia page, it will say that I'm 47 — I'm actually 49. That's because I changed the entry."
For the record, the age on his Wikipedia is now correct, listing him as 50 as of 2024.
3. In a since-removed 2015 article, the Australian magazine Women's Day reported that then-29-year-old Rebel Wilson was actually 36-year-old Melanie Bownds, citing an alleged former classmate and old yearbook pictures as evidence. Rebel initially denied the reports in a lighthearted tweet, but she later sued the magazine's publisher, Bauer Media, for defamation.
Initally, Rebel tweeted, "OMG I'm actually a 100 year old mermaid formerly known as 'CC Chalice'….thanks shady Australian press for your tall poppy syndrome x."
Then, in 2017, Rebel's defamation suit went to trial. The journalist behind the original piece claimed Rebel lied during an interview, which the actor denied. Rebel also said that the resulting articles hurt her career by making her out to be a liar, which ultimately cost her two Dreamworks animation roles.
After three weeks in court, a Supreme Court jury ultimately ruled in Rebel's favor and awarded her $3.66 million, which she pledged to invest in the Australian film industry and give to charity.
On Home Delivery, she said, "If I was guilty of something, I mean, I don't really have any skeletons in my closet, which is why it's quite hard for people to write bad stuff about me. You know, I don't have a drug addiction or a secret child. But I think when I did go to America, I kind of just stopped saying my age...But the reality is when you work in America, you have to show your passport and your visa for every single job, so it's not like you can hide how old you were. So for the press to do a story that I was deliberately lying or whatever, no. I was just being a lady and not telling my age when I moved to America. That's not really a crime. Also, most actresses do that."
4. From 2000–2019, Laverne Cox lied about her age. In 2022, she told The Ellen Show, "I was 28 years old, and I was dating a guy that was 21, and he broke up with me because he said I was too old. And I was like, 'Oh, if I'm too old, I'll just be 22.'"
After a few years, though, she didn't want to lie about being 22 anymore.
She continued, "'Over 21' became my age. And so I was 'Over 21' from like 2002 to 2019."
However, when IMDB "figured out" her real age, Laverne "was having such anxiety" and worried it would make her seem like she "wasn't hirable" or "dateable."
However, she spoke with her therapist about these feelings. When she was speaking at an event in 2019, she said her real age out loud for the first time.
She told The Ellen Show, "I thought the sky was going to fall, but it was like nothing. And it was a reminder that in our heads, we might have shame about something...and no one really cares."
5. When Laurence Fishburne auditioned for Apocalypse Now, he claimed he was 16, but he was actually 14. The gig was up when producer Fred Roos recognized him from a previous project. However, a secretary's opinion that he could pass for 18 helped him get the role.
In 2013, Laurence told George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight, "A young woman who was working in the offices, a secretary, got up and walked through. And as she was walking, Francis [Ford Coppola, the director] finally spoke up, and he just looked at her and said, 'Excuse me, you think this kid could be 18?' And whoever this young woman was, she turned around, looked at me, and went, 'Yeah.'"
6. Beyoncé has been subjected to rumors that she's lying about her age throughout her career. In 2015, her dad, Matthew Knowles, inadvertently added fuel to the fire, telling Power 105.1's Breakfast Club, "[Destiny's Child] had competitiveness, L.A Reid had a rival girl group at the time, and I'll bet you don't know who the lead singer was. It was Pink! And she was the exact same age as Beyoncé." At the time, Pink was 36, and Beyoncé was reportedly 34.
However, in the same interview, he said, "I think [Destiny's Child] have so much because they started so early in life. This goes back to eight years old, and now we're talking 34."
It's likely that he meant Pink and his daughter are roughly the same age, and he probably didn't know Pink's exact age.
7. During her time in B*Witched, Sinéad O'Carroll reportedly "had to lie about [her] age" because she was 24, while the other group members were 17.
On The Six O'Clock Show in 2020, she reportedly said, "Our management wanted me to lie about my age, so I had to discard so many things that I did with my life in interviews."
Her real birth year was reportedly revealed by Showbiz Ireland in the early '00s.
8. In 2014, Lana Del Rey told Rolling Stone that she'd just turned 29, contradicting reports that she'd recently celebrated her 28th birthday. She also denied that the misreports were her fault.
She said, "People have said different ages."
9. In a 2016 interview with Constance Wu, Vulture brought up conflicting reports that she was either 26 or 34. Constance replied, "I think originally on Wikipedia it listed my age incorrectly. There’s a lot of ageism in the industry, so when people would talk about it, I wouldn’t correct them."
"I just wouldn’t say anything about it. But then after a while I was just like, Fuck it," she said.
She also confirmed she was 34 at the time.
10. Suicide member Alan Vega reportedly let the public believe he was a decade younger than his actual age until he released the Alan Vega 70th Birthday Limited Edition EP Series in 2008.
11. And finally, in 2001, Nadine Coyle — who'd later rise to fame as a member of Girls Aloud — competed on Irish Popstars. Competitors had to be at least 18, but since she was only 16, she lied about her age. However, she accidentally spilled her own secret during an interview.
A producer discovered that she'd put 1983 as her birth year on her paperwork and confronted her about the contradiction. Nadine tried to backtrack then acted like she didn't know where her passport was.
Off camera, she came clean about her real age. She had to leave the show, despite her bandmates' protests.
Here's the full clip:
