For most of us, celebrities are often beauty and fashion idols. This is especially true for the younger crowd, who idolize celebrities and often follow the trends set by them. This is why many celebrities, who set body positivity as an example, are the ones most appreciated by their fans. People like Harry Styles have normalized having extra nipples, while Seal is unbothered by his facial scars. This tells their fans that having an unusual feature simply means you are unique.
Bright Side found 13 celebrities who are thought of as idols, more so because they revel in a strange body part or feature. These celebs teach us that being exceptional is cool.
1. Megan Fox is okay with her club thumbs.
35-year-old Megan Fox is counted as one of the most beautiful women in Hollywood, club thumbs and all. Club or clubbed thumbs, and/or fingers, is medically referred to as brachydactyly, is a shortening of bones in the fingers. If you notice her thumbs, they are short, thick at the tips, and the nail bears a downward curve.
It’s an inherited condition and usually bears no health connotations. Fox spoke about her “toe thumbs” on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno, saying “they’re weird and they’re really fat.” She brushed it off and said that she probably had them because her mother ate too much tuna when she was pregnant with Fox.
2. Kate Bosworth has heterochromia (differently colored eyes).
Actress Kate Bosworth, 39, has dual-colored eyes, blue and brown. The condition is known as heterochromia iridium and Bosworth is pretty cool about it. She once said in an interview, “It’s a defect, you know. I notice it more when the light is very gray.”
While she may put on colored contacts for a movie role, Bosworth is happy to let everyone see her beautiful eyes.
3. Dancer Cassandra Naud has a very distinctive facial birthmark.
Cassandra Naud is a queer dancer, actress, and entrepreneur from Canada who was shot into the limelight because of her unusual beauty. She has a large birthmark under her right eye, medically called a nevus, which she is rather proud of.
She said in an interview, “I feel like it’s been such a positive thing in my life. It helps me be more memorable, which is super important in this industry as a performer.”
4. Indian actor Hrithik Roshan has 2 thumbs on his right hand.
Indian actor Hrithik Roshan, 48, has 2 thumbs on his right hand. With trademark green eyes and a rather muscular physique, he has successfully carved out a career in Bollywood, the Indian film industry.
Media reports that he considered his 2 thumbs a lucky charm and would not like to have surgery to remove one of them. He also tweeted about how he used to cry about it when he was a schoolboy, but now, people fan over it. Later, in a Facebook post, he also called it “beautifully imperfect.”
5. Forest Whitaker has a drooping eye.
Lauded actor Forest Whitaker, 60, has a drooping or sleepy eyelid, medically known as ptosis. This is a genetic condition that he inherited from his father, and it does affect his vision.
It does not bother him, as is apparent by his statements about it in an interview. “I don’t really think about this eye, other than the times people talk about it, or when people take photographs of me sometimes they might say stuff about it. I don’t think it makes me look bad or anything. It just is,” said Whitaker.
6. Shaun Ross has albinism as well as extra skin on his nose.
Model, actor, singer, and producer Shaun Ross is an albino African American. Albinism is a genetic condition that causes the skin, hair, and eyes to have little or no color, and can affect people of all ethnicities.
Ross was bullied for his looks as a child, but always believed in himself. He has a simple message to all, “I don’t want people to feel sorry for me because I don’t feel sorry for myself. I am extremely proud of myself and I wish everybody would be proud of themselves.”
7. Sylvester Stallone has partial facial paralysis from birth.
Actor Sylvester Stallone, 75, is known for his tough onscreen persona and amazing body. But he has not had it easy, because when the doctor delivered him, via forceps, one of his facial nerves was severed. This left the infant Stallone with partial facial paralysis on his left side, affecting his lip, chin, and half of his tongue.
Stallone admits, as a child, he did not want to be him. With a speech impediment, and what the experts called a “dormant brain,” Stallone turned to bodybuilding and acting. The rest, as they say, is history.
8. Anna Paquin loves the gap in her teeth.
Actress, producer, and director Anna Paquin, 39, is known as much for her work as for her gap-toothed smile. While many in the industry, like Dakota Johnson, have lost the gap in their front teeth and want it back, Paquin is happy to have retained hers.
She stated in an interview, “Well, it’s never bothered me. I’ve never understood why people are quite so interested in my teeth. I’m not even someone who smiles that much.”
9. Model Khoudia Diop is known as the melanin goddess.
25-year-old Senegalese model Khoudia Diop calls herself the “Melanin Goddess,” because of her unusually dark skin tone. A successful model, Diop was bullied as a child because of her dark color.
Initially, Diop would fight back, insulting the bullies in return. Now, she had a different perspective. “Today, I’d tell them that I really love them. I’d thank them because they made me realize how unique I am,” said Diop.
10. Model Salem Mitchell flaunts her freckles.
Model Salem Mitchell was discovered on Twitter after she posted a picture with bananas, in response to the trolls who called her one. Paper Magazine invited her to do a feature and from then on, Mitchell has been a successful model, freckles and all.
Mitchell said people’s comments never bothered her. In an interview, she stated, “I’ve had people say things about my freckles and little things about me, but I personally never let it get to me, just because I’m comfortable with myself and I’ve been comfortable with myself for a long time. I understand that what somebody says about me doesn’t determine who I am.”
11. Inflammation left Mila Kunis with heterochromia.
Mila Kunis, 38, was blind in one eye for many years because of a medical condition called chronic iritis that leads to cataract build-up on the lens. Over the years, her eyes became different colors until she finally had surgery to replace the defective lens, which happened in 2011.
12. Henry Cavill has partial heterochromia.
Henry Cavill, 38, is best known for playing Superman in the DCEU (DC Extended Universe). While he’s Mr. Perfection in the role, he too has segmental heterochromia. Just a little of his left eye is brown, instead of blue.
13. Ashton Kutcher has webbed feet.
Ashton Kutcher, 44, is best known for his roles in series like That ’70s Show, Two and a Half Men, and more recently, for playing Steve Jobs in the eponymous movie.
He has webbed toes and was more than happy to share this fact on national television as he did on BBC, with Jonathan Ross, saying, “I have connected toes…They’re slightly webbed. When everything else is this good-looking, something has got to be messed up!” Medically, this condition is called syndactyly, and in Kutcher’s case, it’s his second and third toes that are partially fused.
Do you have a unique feature or body part? How has it affected or defined you in life? Share your inspirational stories with us.