He shared a big birthday with the new royal baby Princess Charlotte, but despite turning 40, David Beckham only seems to get better with age. And he’s not the only one …
Let’s face it, he has always been pretty darn gorgeous.
So when David Beckham first burst into fame, fortune and female hearts back in the mid-Nineties, it was hard to imagine a man so handsome, could ever become more handsome. And yet, that’s exactly what has happened. Now, somehow, even after 20-odd years of improving handsomeness, after celebrating his 40th birthday, the football legend/father-of-four/model and all-round-one-man-super-brand, is looking better than ever.
But does reaching the big ’four-oh’ mean he’s surely reached his peak? Is it all going to be middle-aged spread, wrinkles and receding hairlines from here on in?
Probably not. Because, well, he’s David Beckham, and also, it turns that out a lot of men get better, not worse, with age. Here are a few other male celebs who are maturing very nicely indeed …
GARY BARLOW
Oh Gary, the ultimate ’looks tortoise’ in the ’tortoise and hare looks race’. He might not have adorned the Smash Hits poster pages as much as his fellow bandmates back in the Nineties, but if magazine’s poster pages were still a thing, he and his newly lean and chiselled self would definitely be adorning them now. Robbie who?
PHILLIP SCHOFIELD
It was always going to be difficult for a man sitting in a cupboard with a hairy yellow puppet to seem sexually attractive. But fast-forward a few decades on from his Gordon The Gopher days, and Phillip Schofield has transformed into the nation’s ultimate twinkly-eyed silver fox.
JON HAMM
Curtains (that Nineties craze for men to have an inexplicably-centrally-parted fringe) didn’t do many favours for many people. Especially a young Jon Hamm. hankfully, 20 years and a starring role in Mad Men later, and Hamm has said goodbye to the curtains, and shone rather a lot of light on how painfully attractive he is.
GARY LINEKER
The hair, the ears, the slightly too-big-for-his-face features – the more youthful Gary Lineker might have been a footballing legend, but a ’looker’ he was not. The less youthful Lineker, however, is very much ticking both boxes.
HARRISON FORD
He’s always had it going on, so strictly speaking, Harrison Ford hasn’t got better with age, he’s just kept up a steady level of hotness. But the fact he’s done it despite now being in his 70s, and (more crucially) despite deciding to get his ear pierced, is an achievement that deserves to be marked.
STEVE COOGAN
Opting to play roles like Alan Partridge clearly means Coogan was never a man planning on becoming a heart-throb. But sometimes plans go awry, and now here he is, being an all serious actor, clean-cut and generally very nice to look at.
ALAN RICKMAN
The distinctive voice has always been there, but it just seems to fit Rickman better now he’s older – as do those knowing stares, brooding eyes and meaningful frowns. In fact, perhaps that’s why his partner, Rima Horton, just recently decided after 50 years together, that the time was finally right to become Mrs Rickman.
PETER ANDRE
Admittedly, things could only get better after ’that’ Mysterious Girl phase, ’that’ marriage to Katie Price, and ’those’ musical comeback attempts. But still, Peter Andre (now with mercifully shorter hair, shorter time in the tanning salon and a newly-acquired doting father image) is definitely a man on the up.
RICHARD BACON
He’s not quite 40, but he’s heading there (his birthday is in November), and we have no doubt he’ll pass the landmark birthday with quite some style. From his wholesome days on Blue Peter, through his less wholesome days after it, Richard Bacon just seems to have got cleverer, cooler, funnier – and just generally sexier.