IT'S not even been 24 hours since the start of this year’s Celebrity Big Brother and actor Mickey Rourke has already caused drama for apparently “ogling” host AJ Odudu.
And fans were also shocked by his very surprising appearance, which looked transformed from the from the 80s.
The actor, 72, has had quite the number of over the years, so as gets underway, we take a look back at the many faces of Mickey Rourke.
Rourke was born in 1952 and faced a tough upbringing with an allegedly abusive stepfather, prompting him to take up boxing.
However, by the start of the 80s he’d ditched the ring for Hollywood, quickly establishing himself as one of the decade’s biggest heartthrobs in hits such as 9 ½ weeks and Body Heat.
With smouldering good looks and an edginess picked up in boxing gyms, it wasn’t long before he was established as a top sex symbol, drawing comparisons to stars like Marlon Brando.
After his performance in 1987’s Angel Heart opposite , it was even said his legend could have been bigger than James Dean’s.
But his chaotic personal life and threatening behaviour on set saw him blacklisted from Hollywood and he return to boxing in 1991, aged 38.
Though he remained undefeated in eight fights, his habit of sparring without headgear left him with injuries including two broken noses, a split tongue, fractured cheekbones, and even the threat of brain damage.
These injuries saw him go under the surgeon’s knife to bring back his old good looks – but if anything, they did more harm to his face than good.
After a slow return to acting in the late Nineties, he finally secured his comeback in 2005 with a role in neo-noir thriller Sin City.
By now, his face not only bore the scars of his years in the wilderness, but also the failure of years of surgery to fix the damage done by boxing.
It wasn’t until 2009 that he finally admitted his changing face was down to .
“Most of it was to mend the mess of my face because of the boxing,”; he said. “But I went to the wrong guy to put my face back together.”;
He added: “I had my nose broken twice. I had five operations on my nose and one on a smashed cheekbone.
“I had to have cartilage taken from my ear to rebuild my nose and a couple of operations to scrape out the cartilage because the scar tissue wasn't healing properly. That was one of the most painful operations, but the worst was haemorrhoids.”
But rumours that Mickey had undergone surgery had also swirled before his move into boxing, when he appeared to have a much fuller face in the steamy 1990 film Wild Orchid.
And fans were right to be suspicious, according to his ex-wife Debra Fuer.
“He’ll kill me for saying this but he wanted the part in one film so badly that he got cheek implants,”; she told The Mirror.
“He told me he was swollen because he’d had his molar teeth removed. But I knew that was untrue – he didn’t have any molars to take out.”;
Though he won critical acclaim with 2008’s The Wrestler, Mickey was now trapped in a cycle of getting facial surgery to fix previous botched operations.
In recent years, there's been no slowing down on the plastic surgery, though he hasn't tried to hide it either.
In a 2017 he posted a pic of himself next to his surgeon. “Moments after nose surgery with Dr. Dhir. Now I am pretty again…one more to go,” was his caption.
The actor has managed to stay active over the years too, briefly returning to boxing in 2014 for a fight with 20-year-old Elliot Seymore, and more recently took up Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
In an Instagram post from over the weekend – captioned “LIVERPOOL strong” – Mickey once again showed off his more-weathered look as he prepared to head into the Big Brother house.
And now the series is underway, it's only a matter of time until we see just how much of a storm he's able to kick up.
