Jared Leto was scared, afraid the worst had happened: the death of his eyebrows.
In an appearance on "The Ellen Show" this week promoting his role as The Joker, Leto told Ellen Degeneres that he had to wax his brows not once but twice in his life, for two different roles (in "Dallas Buyer's Club" and "Suicide Squad"). "They started to grow back slower and slower, so I got a little scared," said Leto.
Don't worry, they grew back!
But could that really happen? Could you shave or wax your eyebrows enough times that eventually they just don't grow back?
"The follicle of the eyebrow is typically weaker than the rest of the body," Noemi Grupenmager, founder and CEO of Uni K Wax Centers, told HuffPost, adding that there's nothing wrong with waxing your eyebrows. "Keep in mind, though, that if you remove the entire eyebrow consistently over many years you may run the risk of the eyebrow hair not growing back the same."
So how many times would Leto have to shave his eyebrows for movies before they stopped growing back? "Hair always grows," Grupenmager said, "however if he were to aggressively wax or shave for many years, long term, the hair that does come back would grow unevenly or spotty."
We're not sure if the world can handle a Leto with spotty brows, but luckily, it sounds like his next role will keep them safely intact: "It's going to be strange to make a film with eyebrows, and without lipstick," he told Ellen. "I'm going to feel kind of naked."