What Tricks the Actresses of the Golden Age of Hollywood Used in the Name of Beauty

Modern stars do a lot of things in the name of beauty: botox injections, hyaluronic acid, ribs removal, buccal fat extraction, and lips augmentation. Hollywood actresses of the past didn’t have all these options, but they had their own secrets and beauty life hacks. Some are really simple and some need additional tools, whereas others are pretty radical.

We at CHEERY found out which hacks helped Hollywood legends shine not only in movies but also outside the set.

Marilyn Monroe

In order to maintain her hair color, the actress bleached it every 3 weeks with a team of hairdressers. She also grew hair on her face by using a hormonal cream. Studio bosses suggested that she shaved it, but she didn’t want to ⁠— she liked it when the light was on her, and the hairs made her face glow.

Marlene Dietrich

The actress never used mascara on her lower eyelashes because she thought they would make her look tired. The actress liked to leave the half-moon on her nails unpainted so a grown-out manicure would be less noticeable.

June Knight

Jumping rope is a popular exercise to stay fit. But June Knight did it in her own way — on heels. She thought it let her keep her waist slim, and her buttocks and calves sculpted.

Betty Grable

The star avoided getting a double chin using an exercise called “bird pecking”. It consists in pushing the lips out in a pout and the neck forward like a pecking bird.

Jean Harlow

The star didn’t hide the fact that she spent a lot of time caring for her platinum locks. When Harlow realized that the harsh lights of the film studio were drying out her strands, she would give herself a scalp massage with castor oil once a week.

Gloria Swanson

The main secret of her beautiful and healthy skin was raw vegetables. She didn’t eat them as often as she put them on her face. She said, “As far as I am concerned, there is no beauty product better than raw vegetables.”

Carole Lombard

At the height of her career, the star got into a car crash and hurt her nose, which became a little crooked. So to make it straighter, she drew a thin white line on the nose before applying makeup.

Frances Starr

Every night, the actress did 20 somersaults. The exercise helped her keep a healthy color on her face and deal with stomach problems. She explained in an interview, “Now that my liver has turned over 20 times, it will behave.”

Rita Hayworth

Her auburn locks drove a lot of people crazy in the 1940s. To make them look stunning, Hayworth had a little trick: she would wash her hair with hot water, rinse it, then saturate it with oil, and wrap it in a towel for 15 minutes. Then she’d rinse it out with hot water, a cleanser, and lemon juice to get rid of any leftover residue.

Nita Naldi

To keep fit, she had a specific diet that was popular among movie stars at the beginning of the previous century. It was lamb chops and pineapple.

She would drink a cup of black coffee for breakfast, have a lamb chop and a piece of pineapple for lunch, and then for dinner, she would have 2 lamb chops and 2 slices of pineapple.

Joan Crawford

To make her eyes shine, Crawford had an unusual life hack — she put boric acid into them. As strange as it sounds, boric acid is often used as a base for eye drops. But we can’t recommend following her example.

The actress also shared that Katharine Hepburn taught her a small hair trick: washing it with raw eggs. For greasy hair, Crawford would use some cologne.

Billie Burke

The star of The Wizard Of Oz kept fit by doing a special exercise. She’d hold onto a doorway and would actually swing from it. She believed this way she was tightening her arm muscles, lengthening her spine, and expanding her chest.

Audrey Hepburn

The actress had quite dry skin, so she often used a lot of moisturizing creams and oils. Aside from all the beauty products, she’d often apply Greek yogurt on her face for 30 minutes, and then she’d wash it off. This product contains lactic acid that carefully exfoliates the skin and moisturizes it.

What beauty secrets and life hacks do you have?