Actors That Wore Wigs To Hide A Secret While Filming

It's a pretty obvious observation that there's a lot of fake hair out there when it comes to what Hollywood actors and actresses are holding on their heads. It seems as if there's always an easy fix when it comes to perfecting their supposed flaws. Whether it's on or off set, producers have even gotten to a point where they are willing to put down a pretty penny to make these performers look perfect. However, when committing to a new character, sometimes the requirements call for hair that's just not there — hence the wonderful world of wigs.

It turns out that some stars are holding a secret beneath their hairlines in a few of our favorite films and TV show ... and many may warrant a re-watch, because truthfully, we would have never guessed it. From practically balding to bleaching their hair beyond repair, here are actors who wore wigs to hide a secret while filming.

Jim Halpert's natural 'do in the popular television series The Office doesn't seem like it would warrant a wig. However, actor John Krasinski had other aspirations for his acting career.

To be able to star in the 2008 film Leatherheads, Krasinski was required to get a 1920s style haircut. Unfortunately, the actor was in the midst of filming season three of The Office, and for continuity and contractual purposes, needed pre-approval from showrunner Greg Daniels — who apparently wasn't happy that character Jim's hairdo would be more of a buzz than his signature messy mop. However, this TV star wasn't about to give up a spot on the big screen that easily: Krasinski secretly partnered with the popular sitcom's on-set hair stylist, Kim Ferry, for assistance, who helped him to have a wig made out of human hair resembling his character's look.

Krasinski put it on and headed to Daniels' office to make his case. However, the showrunner still wouldn't budge. "Greg kept saying, 'No! I would know if you're wearing a wig,'" Ferry recalled to Mashable, explaining that this was when Krasinski made the ultimate reveal. "So John leaned over the desk and said, 'No I don't think you would.' That's when he ripped it off and shut it down, and we got to do the wig."

As Jim Halpert famously says on the The Office, "Everything I have I owe to this job ... this stupid, wonderful, boring, amazing job."

It turns out that in the movie Mean Girls, Kevin G. knew a bit more than math. In 2016, he revealed to Seventeen that the most popular Plastic — Regina George, played by Rachel McAdams — had hair that wasn't real after all. 

"They had a [$10,000] wig made out of human hair by a very well-known wig maker," actor Rajiv Surendra explained. "... I don't know if this is actually true, but I remember hearing something about Rachel not wanting to bleach all of her hair." And we don't blame her, considering many actresses have admitted to losing their hair after continually coloring it platinum blonde to play famous characters. It also happened to be the same year that McAdams starred as a fun-loving redhead in The Notebook. However, while McAdams has yet to admit herself that her hair was as fake as her character's personality in the film, her co-star Surendra remembers it vividly. "I remember walking in to the makeup and hair trailer regularly and seeing the wig being washed," he divulged.  

Even though the Plastics were only allowed to wear ponytails once a week, it surprised everyone everywhere to hear that Regina George was supposedly wearing fake hair everyday. That's why her hair is so big. It's full of secrets!

Robert Pattinson was secretly a vampire in the Twilight series, and it turns out he was secretly wearing a wig, too. After the cast had filmed the final installment of the film franchise, Breaking Dawn — Part 2, Pattinson decided to cut his hair and prepare for his next project. However, this happened before he was asked to come back to reshoot scenes of the vampire series. Oops! 

"It was the first time I had to wear a wig," Pattinson revealed at the San Diego Comic-Con in 2012 (via People). "I couldn't believe my last two days on Twilight they put this orange wig on my hair."

His co-star, Taylor Lautner, is infamous for wearing a wig of long locks while playing Jacob in the movies. Yet, Pattinson's reveal seemed to be even more shocking than the moment his character, Edward, first tells Kristen Stewart's Bella he's an immortal creature. The wig, Pattinson admitted, was "an amalgamation of six [different] wigs," and made him feel like even more of a monster ("Frankenstein's monster," to be exact), so hopefully it helped him to get even more in character?

Actress Ashley Benson went brunette while filming the television series Pretty Little Liars, because she was "bored," according to a 2013 interview with E! News. Also, because her hair was falling out.

Benson bleached her hair quite often to keep up with her character, Hanna Marin's, signature hairstyle, so much so that the blonde was making the young actress practically go bald by season three. "I got a call from Warner Bros. like, 'You need to do something with your hair,' and I'm like well, duh, I'm bald!" she later explained to Elle, adding, "Bleaching my hair was my biggest regret." That's when a wig came in handy.

To keep from having her hair fall out completely — and to conceal the new hue of her 'do — Benson wore a wig for a season of the series. It was a win-win situation. It made it much easier to maintain her original mane, and it kept her character's trademark style intact. However, as much as the wig made her time worthwhile, Benson won't be wearing one off-screen. "Only when I film," she told E! News. "They're itchy and hot."

James Bond is an icon. Between his fast cars and sculpted body, he has always had ladies swooning by his side. It only makes sense that the man that originally played him, Sean Connery, was later named People's Sexiest Man Alive in 1989. Heck, he was even given the title of Sexiest Man of the Century a decade later. However, hair or no hair, they didn't care. Few know that the celeb was actually balding when Connery played Bond.

The story of his hair loss began at an early age, long before Connery spent two decades portraying the celebrated spy. But the Scotsman was never for a wig. "I threw the blasted thing in the waste can,” he even admitted to The Virginian-Pilot during one of his later films. As Bond was ageing along with the actor, Connery requested to go wig-less for his final film in the franchise, but producers still wouldn't allow it (via Esquire). They probably figured a bald 007 wouldn't work. After all, there's already the bald Bond villain, Ernst Stavro Blofeld. Unfortunately, no hair is a look that's usually saved for villains in pop culture.  

However, Connery seems to have gotten the last laugh and his shining moment to show off his equally shiny head. During a scene that made the final cut in his movie Wrong is Right, in the midst of working on the Bond films, he throws off his toupee on camera.

Keira Knightley has been acting since the '90s and has played pretty much every character you can think of. Each role had a completely new look, as well, and that includes the locks on their heads — in every color of the rainbow. She's sure had her fair share of haircare. "It got so bad that my hair literally began to fall out of my head!" the actress explained to Instyle UK (via The Cut) in 2016 of all the hair dyeing she was doing. "So for the past five years I've used wigs, which is the greatest thing that has ever happened to my hair."

Unfortunately, Knightley never clarified the wigs were only used onscreen, not in her every day life, and social media quickly insinuated that this poor actress was balding ... which really only makes sense when you admit to the world that your hair was falling out. After all of the confusion — and after multiple companies had mailed her their female baldness products — Knightley was forced to clarify things. 

"I do wear wigs for films ... which is a great thing and has saved my hair," Knightley told The Cut. Putting a button on it, she quipped to the interviewer, "You can give it a tug if you want! It's there, and I'm very happy it is there. And if anyone needs any products if they are losing it, I have a lot at home."

After the release of Fantastic Four in 2015, the Internet was in an uproar — and it wasn't over the ill-fated flick's subpar reviews. From scene to scene, it appeared as though superhero Sue Storm's hair had changed. Rather than invisibility and force fields, reporter Kyle Buchanan of Vulture quipped to The Frame, "It seems like her special power is making her scalp disappear."

However, there was at least some intention behind this insanity. Actress Kate Mara had already cut her hair for her next movie when she was required to head back to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as part of reshoots for the film. The solution, it seemed, was to throw a blonde wig on the actress in order to complete the blockbuster movie, but her wig had critics all over thinking it was anything but fantastic. As Buchanan wrote in his own piece, "It's so glaringly obvious when the recently shorn Mara is wearing her Reshoots Wig that her hair's length, color, and texture varies ... sometimes even from shot to shot." With a $120 million budget, you'd think producers could afford something a bit more realistic — or at least extensions.

Despite fans getting fired up over her character's changing look, Mara admitted to IGN that she wouldn't say no to a sequel: "We would love to actually play these characters in another way somehow in the future." (Hopefully with more realistic-looking locks, as well.)

The Dark Knight Rises was a super secret production. Director Christopher Nolan wanted everyone involved to be careful not to let anything slip. When it was announced that then-13-year-old Joey King was involved, Batman fans were focused on finding out what the young actress was up to in regards to the film. 

"I can't give too much away because I promised Mr. Nolan I wouldn't say anything," King told My Entertainment World. "There are too many secrets about the character and the movie." However, the Internet went awry when King revealed that she was playing Talia al Ghul — a role that required her to shave her head.  

With the secrecy surrounding the superhero film, and multiple projects happening at once for the young actress, King had a movie premiere to attend the same night they buzzed her practically bald. "I couldn't tell anybody that I had no hair, because I would have gotten in trouble," King later explained to Clevver Movies. She needed a way to hide her newly shaved head — hence a wig. Her long blonde locks stood out on the red carpet for the film Prom, and people quickly caught on. Her response for the formal 'do? "Being festive for prom!" King recalled. "It was so funny." What else was she supposed to do?

With the '80s setting the scene for Stranger Things, a lot of energy was involved in making sure that every detail matched the era. Over 150 wigs were used during season two, and, interestingly enough, 50 of them appeared on background actors alone, according to Refinery29. Fans, however, would be surprised to know of a specific actor who was wearing one. 

"David [Harbour] wore a wig for the first three months of shooting because he shaved his hair off!" head hairstylist Sarah Hindsgaul revealed to the outlet, admitting that when the cast came back from their break to shoot the second season, she was freaked out to see his new 'do. "I was like, 'No! Hopper doesn't have short hair!'"

While many fans might easily speculate that the bowl cuts and mullets featured in the popular television series can't be real — though, surprisingly, Steve's wondrous hair is — Detective Jim Hopper is one person we didn't imagine would be flashing fake hair. However, the wig could be worse. "You wanna know the worst thing that's ever happened here in the four years I've been working here?" Harbour's character famously says. "It's when an owl attacked Eleanor Gillespie's head because it thought that her hair was a nest."

People probably don't know that the actress starring on The Good Wife didn't have the right kind of hair for her character, Alicia Florrick. Julianna Margulies' natural curls seemed to be out of control when it came to putting together a polished look for her regal role. 

"If the weather changes, my hair starts growing like a Chia pet," Margulies explained on The Late Show with David Letterman in 2015. A wig seemed to be the best option for multiple reasons — including the fact that it only took her 10 minutes out of her 14-hour work days to put it on, saving the actress time to do other stuff. "And I wanted that extra hour it would take to blow dry my hair straight to have with my child," she said of her son, who was only a year old when the seven season series started in 2009. 

Margulies also wore a different wig every season, helping out with continuity and making it easier to throw on for multiple flashback sequences throughout the television series. While all of this makes it seem like it was the obvious choice to wear fake hair, the production had to carve out a pretty penny for each one. Margulies' wigs, which are made entirely out of human hair, cost $10,000 each.

When actress Morena Baccarin left the television series V, she was ready to join another popular TV drama. However, her hair wasn't quite ready for Homeland. As the alien leader Anna on V, the actress bore a bold pixie cut. "That short hair was one of the best things I've ever done in my life," she admitted to Esquire. Unfortunately, not everybody was on board with her keeping her low maintenance cut for other opportunities on the small screen.  

To become Jessica Brody on Homeland, the role required Baccarin to have a bob, but it seemed to be terrible timing for her roots. Coming so quickly from the extraterrestrial series, the actress didn't have too much time to grow her own hair out. The result was having her character wear a wig during the early episodes as she began to grow out her own hairstyle underneath. 

"I'm just ready for a change," Baccarin told Access at the time. "This woman is a very different woman from Anna and I felt it was very important for me to play this character to morph into something else and the hair was a part of that." But honestly, she had to be up for a new 'do if she wanted to star in Homeland. These Hollywood hairpieces are no joke.