Lifestyle

Could It Be Magic?

Legendary Singer Reveals How Many Facelifts He’s Really Had

The 82-year-old opened up about undergoing major surgery to alter his appearance.

Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

PublishedMay 28, 2026, 12:32 PM EDT

UpdatedMay 28, 2026, 12:33 PM EDT

Updated May 28, 2026, 12:33 PM EDTPublished May 28, 2026, 12:32 PM EDT

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Legendary crooner Barry Manilow is finally sharing insight into his plastic surgery history after years of rumors about his youthful appearance.

The 82-year-old “Copacabana” singer opened up about his cosmetic enhancements in an interview with the Los Angeles Times published Wednesday.

“I look fantastic, but I’m a hundred years old, right?” the celebrated artist said.

He continued, “I don’t know how that happened, by the way—I don’t get Botox or anything.

The interviewer then asked whether Manilow had gone under the knife.

“No!” he exclaimed at first, but then continued, “I must say: There was one time when we lived in L.A. that I did do a facelift.”

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Manilow lived in Los Angeles on and off throughout his career, including in the 1970s and the late ‘90s. He now resides with his husband and manager, Garry Kief, in a spacious 9,798-square-foot home in Palm Springs.

Beyond the facelift—a procedure he clarified he had undergone only once—he also had less-invasive cosmetic enhancements.

“After that, it’s just been a little here, a little there,” he said, adding, “I see something falling down, sure, I’ll do that. I’m as vain as anybody else.”

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These revelations come after decades of fan speculations around Manilow’s appearance, including rumors of Botox and dermal fillers.

The Emmy-, Grammy-, and Tony-winning singer said he gets compliments for his looks.

“One of my old friends, his mother said, ‘I always knew he was talented, but when did he get so handsome?’”

Manilow, who revealed in December that he was diagnosed with lung cancer, also talked about his health journey.

He said the doctors discovered “a big black thing in my chest” during an X-ray. It turned out to be a cancerous tumor.

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Manilow was on tour when he found out the news and did not plan to cut his concerts short.

“[The doctors] wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible, so we made a deal: I’d finish the couple of weeks of shows that I had, then I’d go to the hospital, and they’d remove it. It was supposed to be a no-brainer—it hadn’t spread yet, thank goodness," he recalled.

But then, he started experiencing alarming symptoms.

“My AFib kicked in, and acid reflux kicked in, and pneumonia kicked in,” Manilow explained, referring to atrial fibrillation, an abnormal heart rhythm. “They rushed me to the ICU for seven days.”

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He told the outlet that he had a “pretty stupid” thought that his busy schedule would prevent him from falling ill.

“I never thought cancer would get me—it wasn’t in the cards,“ he said.

Manilow added, “What I realized is that I’ve always been the leader—leader of the band, leader of an audience—but I wasn’t the leader of this one. That was a big lesson for me. I had to rely on everybody else. Nurses, doctors, friends—you should see some of the notes people have sent."

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Although the legendary entertainer is now cancer-free following a successful lung surgery, he has not yet been able to return to the stage.

But that does not mean Manilow has been sitting still. He has been working on his next album, What a Time, which will be released on June 5.

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Roosa RahkonenReporter, The Looker

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